Regional fire study to begin
By Jeff Gallatin
Westshore
Published July 15, 2009

Officials from the West Shore Council of Governments have turned up the heat by selecting a consulting firm to do a study on having a regional fire  district.

Officials tapped Emergency Services Consulting International Inc., of Wilsonville, Ore., to do the study from among four bids. The firm’s bid was $137,492 with COG officials hoping to pay for a large portion of it by obtaining a $100,000 grant from the EfficientGovNow which is giving $300,000 to three different projects designed to help 16 Northeast Ohio counties increase government efficiency, save money and strengthen the economy. The COG proposal is the only Cuyahoga County project from among the nine finalists for the three grants.

Bay Village Mayor Debbie Sutherland, chairwoman of the COG board this year, said the ESC proposal was deemed the best match for study needs.

“It’s a balanced proposal and will give us the best blend of information and work in the communities involved,” she said.

In addition to Bay Village, the other members of the West Shore Central Dispatch group, Fairview Park, North Ridgeville, Rocky River and Westlake are part of the study group. Lakewood and North Olmsted also are part of the study proposal.

“We’ve got a strong and balanced group of applicants and we wanted an experienced organization to handle it,” she said. “They’ve promised to evaluate all the data and give us a recommendation as to whether to proceed. If they deem a district as an option, they’ll tell us.”

Sutherland said the study could determine different things.

“They might tell us that it’s good to have all of us involved or maybe some but not all of the cities involved in the study,” she said. “It’s good to have objective data.”

Phil Kouwe, project manager for the COG study and senior vice president at ESC, said they will approach it in a business like manner.

“We look at in the sense of whether it would make sense to do,” he said.

He said all the team members participating in the study have some experience or expertise with fire and emergency services as well other aspects of municipal government.

“We have a lot of people who have been in the fire service but we also have people who have worked on municipal finances as well as other aspects of city government so we should be able to examine everything pretty closely and give a good view of what this would take,” he said.

He said the fact that the West Shore governments have teamed up on other projects in both the governmental and safety aspects of fire and emergency services will aid the study.

“We look at each city individually but it also helps to see how they have worked together,” he said.

Kouwe said time on studies varies, but said they can take up to about five months to do.

Other area municipal officials liked the selection.

“Doing a regional fire district is a natural next step from the central dispatch organization,” said Westlake Mayor Dennis Clough. “We already have a strong base with that as well as with our working together on many emergency and mutual aid calls for many years.”

North Olmsted Mayor Thomas O’Grady sees it as a good way to deal with financial issues.

“Creation of a West Shore Fire District  has immense potential to reduce costs, increase services and improve training without disruption of response times.”

North Olmsted Fire Chief Tom Klecan said the study will be a major benefit.

“We had four very strong applications,” he said. “This will help by examining many different aspects of the fire and emergency services.”

Sutherland said the scope of the project should be wide.

“What is good about the proposal is that they will be talking to everybody, the governments, the people in fire and emergency services and the communities. We should get the best look possible from this on how to proceed.