Notes on the Gold Hill Fire Protection District Board Meeting 9-21-21 – reported by Gretchen Diefenderfer

The meeting was called to order by President Rich Lopez.  Present were Chief Chris Finn, Board members Chris Dirolf, Boyd Brown, and Secretary Kent Coghill, Community members Marcus Moench, Rick Sheingold, , Steffi Wilson, Leslie Finn, Kris Gibson, Max Yeager, Gretchen Diefenderfer.  Jessica Brookhart was out.

Minutes – approval was deferred as several people had not read them

Fire Chief’s Report – Since the Board did not meet last month, Chris’s report covered two months: 3 medical calls and staged only for a 4^th, 1 campfire call, and 4 trainings – pumps, stabilization, and helicopter training.

            Max Mazurkiwitz is in Structure Academy, Sarah O’Brien is planning to take the 130/190 FF course if it’s not cancelled.

            There is a meeting with FDs and BoCo Dispatch to clarify some issues.  Potentially changing radio frequencies from UHF requiring new radios? –  

            Leslie and Kent are working on our dept. conducting its own pack tests.  An EMT has to be present.

New Station Discussion – Sue Schauffler, Lefthand FPD Board member was here to discuss their new station in  LH and the process involved.  They have 1400 residences, 2500 population, cover 52 square miles, have 3 full time staff, 40 volunteers and a mill levy of 16.117 (ours is 6.64).  They became concerned that their assessed property tax valuation had decreased so they had an election and voted to adjust the mill levy to keep the money the same for homeowners.  They have an overall budget of $780,000: 725,000 from property taxes, 35,000 mitigation, and get $400,000 in dispatch income (sending trucks and volunteers out on out on deployment.  Boyd asked about the possibility of GHFPD doing this – have to be red-carded and have to go on dispatch or it expires – probably not practical for a department as small as ours – tons of paperwork and responsibility.

            Sue stressed  that #1 Space/site and #2 Budget are the biggest issues.  They got a lot of input from their volunteers and staff.  They decided on 4 bays 80‘ long.  They’ve been saving for this, raised the mill levy, did a bunch of fund raising, plus they got a lot of money from DOLA (Colorado Department of Local Affairs), which requires including community space, too.  It has living space, a full kitchen, day room, workout room.  Make sure your architect has experience designing a Fire Department building.  It cost $3.4 million to build the station – you need to have the money up front before beginning.  DOLA requires matching funds and they reimburse you.  The timeline depends on a lot of factors.  Start now gathering information.  They worked with a PR firm to publicize the needs.  Get rid of TABOR restrictions,  include the possibility for growth in the future.  They have a paid bookkeeper plus part time clerical help. Also paid are Chief Chris O’Brien who does the grant writing and they have a treasurer on the board.  Captain David Lindquist is in charge of training and maintenance, Ramesh Jones is the mitigation and dispatch manager.  It all starts with Board conversations – what do we want in 5 years?  Grow?  How much? So many elements are important to the members and the community and you need data.  It takes a lot of discussion around community needs, firefighting, mitigation, community meeting space.  Where can we put it?  How much energy is there to pursue this?  There are lots of grants out there for equipment and there is a strong case for raising the mill levy.

Grant Report – Maya MacHamer reported by email that we have another grant to help with our mitigation plan.

Our Budget –  Chief Finn added that we have lost some of our mill levy as the value of the district has now grown to over $1,000,000 and TABOR restricts the amount of money we can collect.  We have budgeted money to replace both the brush truck and the med truck with one truck.

Kris Gibson reported that we didn’t get the AFG Grant this year and should maybe go together with Fourmile and keep applying year by year.  She also went on the walk with the County Commissioners of our mitigation areas – they would be willing to do another if townspeople are interested – maybe on a weekend – could also go on a walk on the Callwood fire area and the mitigation work there.  She added that mitigation work has progressed on the Ashram property.

Election – The mill levy issue started a discussion of having an election to keep the mill levy the same (or raising it),  which would result in more income for the department.  Our next scheduled election of district directors would be next May.  We often have cancelled these elections due to having no more people willing to run than slots to fill, but we could also add a mill levy increase and an issue to de-TABORize.  Or we could add those issues to the regular November election ballot or go for it in two more years.  We need to start with the fire department lawyer.

Audit – Chris Finn reminded the board that they need to pass a resolution agreeing to exempt us from an audit given the size of our budget.  Kent so moved, Chris Dirolf seconded and the measure passed.

 ARC/GIS – more later

Regional Forestry Supervisor – Boyd and Chris D  met with the Regional State Forestry Supervisor and they would help us update our old CWPP (Community Wildfire Protection Plan) and make it more of a guide for future mitigation work.  Boyd also talked with Bill Atkinson.  They planted all those trees along the Switzerland Trail meadow and then they all got cut down.  It really worked well, though, and the Fen has really recovered – lots more water.

Pension Plan – Rick Sheingold would like information about how it works, etc., what kind of hours count, and how does the whole program work.  He requested visibility of where it all stands.  Chris F. will send out information.  Boyd added that the pp kicks in after 20 years of service, 36 hours per year of training, calls, service.  And they’ve committed $2,000/year to get matching State funds.