Item A: Functional Consolidation of Fire Departments

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ATTACHMENT A count charged to the Ambulance Fund. Maintenance of fire apparatus and ambulances is per- formed by outside vendors – Oregon Apparatus and Hughes Fire Equipment. Several different Fleet Services options would be available with functional consolidation of the departments, depending on future decisions, including continuing with the current separate sys- tems, contracting with an existing governmental agency currently performing the work, out- sourcing all maintenance work, or, in the long term, developing an in-house fleet services shop, which could potentially be a profit-making operation by in-sourcing work from other fire de- partments. Similar work is currently performed by Eugene Fire & EMS in maintaining outside agency self-contained breathing apparatus (SCBA). Information Technology – Existing IT staffing consists of 2.0 FTE in Eugene Fire & EMS, one Eugene Information Services Division position dedicated exclusively to Fire & EMS and funded by Fire & EMS, and 0.5 FTE Springfield Fire & Life Safety staff, for a total of 3.5 FTE. Various Springfield Fire staff are assigned as needed to IT-related tasks, principally servicing of hard- ware in fire stations and on apparatus. In addition, both departments are supported by their re- spective cities’ central IT operations through central service charges. Conclusion In preparation for further steps leading to a new service model as recommended by the consul- tants, we are also recommending that the City Managers be directed to appoint a staff team to begin studying longer-range options including a full merger of the departments, establishment of a long-term Intergovernmental Agreement (IGA) provided for under ORS 190, formation of a new fire service district, or annexation to an existing district, according to your direction. Site visits to successful model merged fire service systems by a group consisting of representatives of elected officials, staff and major stakeholders is recommended as a first step. We trust the above summary and the detailed information attached are responsive to interests ex- pressed at your last work session on this matter. The estimates given are conservative and both departments’ staff believe that additional economies would be identified after systems are merged and re-engineered. We look forward to the discussion at the December 7 joint meeting. If you have any question or comment in the meantime, please contact either of us. 8 ATTACHMENT 1