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City be awarded a SAFER grant. He said that letters of support from elected officials at the local, state and congressional levels were included in the application packet and the City would be notified in three months whether its application was funded. Mayor Piercy called for council questions and comments. Mr. Pap6 clarified that the CCIGR did not approve the budget; it approved the grant application and assumed from the budget deliberations that the Budget Committee was supportive. He thanked the chief for a good plan that accomplishes the council's goal and asked why Fleet Board approval was an element of procuring an additional engine. ChiefTallon said that all fire apparatus was in the Fleet Services budget and the department needed to propose acquisitions and reserve status designation. He said that the acquisition had been approved. City Manager Taylor added that all City vehicles were managed through Fleet Services. Mr. Pap6 referred to a drop in the Valley River Station's response reliability rate after redeployment of the engine to Santa Clara and asked if there was a plan to increase that rate. Chief Tallon said the goal was to restore the formerly high level of service and monthly measurements and reports would begin in January 2006. He expected the response rate to be restored the first month of operations. Ms. Taylor asked why a national recruitment had been conducted for City employees. ChiefTallon explained that was typical for firefighter and police officer recruitments. He said those employees were highly sought after and there was not a sufficient pool of local eligible candidates for firefighter positions because of the extensive education and credential requirements. He said the recruitment also addressed the City's goal to improve hiring of minorities and females into those jobs and a larger applicant pool was necessary to achieve that. Ms. Taylor commented that there was a large number of unemployed people in the city and wondered if the City was letting people know about training opportunities. Chief Tallon replied that the department presented information at high schools, the University of Oregon, Lane Community College (LCC) and other institutions on career days, made ride-alongs available and continually looked for ways to increase those efforts to inform people about the significant schooling and preparation required of applicants. City Manager Taylor said the City had been working with LCC to explore ways to encourage high school students to consider fire service as a career. Mayor Piercy related a conversation she had with Ed Coleman regarding City efforts to reach out to high school students in the minority community to encourage careers in public safety. Mr. Poling thanked the chief for the action plan. He reiterated that the fire equipment rotated from reserve to front line status was in good condition and the Valley River Station was getting a high quality engine. Chief Tallon thanked the council, the City management team and the community on behalf of the department for having some of the best facilities, equipment and support for training. He noted that it was preferable to acquire new engines gradually instead of buying many at once to avoid having to replace all of them at the same time. Mr. Kelly asked what was done differently in the recent recruitment to achieve diversity in hiring. Chief Tallon replied that recruitment was done in partnership with Human Resources, which managed the process. He said the department was committed to continuing and increasing its efforts to attract minority MINUTES--Eugene City Council June 22, 2005 Page 2 Work Session