Dover City Council voted tonight to end its contract with Stewart County Fire & Rescue for fire service for the town.
SCFR has provided fire and rescue services for Dover since 2014. Dover will provide its own fire service at the end of the 2021 calendar year.
It was outlined at tonight’s meeting that Dover plans to create a ‘Public Safety Department’ that will encompass the city’s police and fire departments. All police officers will be cross-trained as firefighters and fire volunteers will be cross -trained as reserve officers, Dover Police Chief Dennis Honholt explained to the council during tonight’s meeting.
The contractual agreement between Dover and SCFR has allowed Stewart County to house some of its fire engines and rescue vehicles and other equipment at the Dover Fire Station in the basement of Dover’s Town Hall. Dover’s fire equipment, including trucks, are used throughout the county and SCFR vehicles and equipment are used in Dover, as per terms of the current contractual agreement.
Even after the contract between the town and SCFR ends, there will continue to be a mutual aid agreement in place where each one will lend assistance to the other, as per the mutual aid agreement.
Dover passed its approximately 3 million dollar budget tonight with an expenditure of $27,500 to Stewart County Fire and Rescue. According to Honholt, it will cost about $165,000 or more to get the Dover Fire Department equipped again and functioning as a city fire department.
He said the first year of a start up is the most expensive and that a big expense will be “turn out gear’ for the town’s firefighters.
City officials say there are plenty of volunteers to start the Dover Fire Department. Dover Mayor Lesa Fitzhugh said Dover had to give up its fire department and ask for fire assistance from SCFR around 2014 because there was a lack of volunteers for the department.
“We would have a fire and no one would show up,” she said.
Some longtime Dover Fire Department officials dispute that and say there was always plenty of volunteers to continue responding to fires in Dover and that lack of volunteers was never a problem.
Fitzhugh said she is getting folks volunteering to her to be Dover firefighters.
“Dover will provide its own fire service after December 29, 2021, which is when the contract ends,
said Dover’s interim city administrator Charles Parks.
Dover City Council member Mike Pulley said the proposal, which was voted on tonight and approved tonight, had caught him off guard. He said the information presented tonight was not enough for him to “be on board” with the plan for Dover to ‘fire up’ its fire department again. The issue has not been brought up as a proposal or possible new business item during the last few previous meetings.
Pulley said he had thought the idea was being presented tonight for discussion only. He said he had no idea it was going to be voted on tonight.
Pulley said during the meeting he thought SCFR had provided exceptional service to Dover at a very favorable price to Dover.
The Dover City Council voted to create another full time position for “implementing public safety.” With the addition of the position, officials say Dover will have a police officer on patrol 24 hours a day, seven days per week.
SCFR Chief Ethan Luffman was as tonight’s Dover City Council meeting. He agreed to speak later in the week with LBLUS.com about what the move by Dover will mean for Stewart County’s Volunteer Fire Service.
THIS STORY WILL UPDATE …
Story Written by David R. Ross ~ LBLUS.com
https://www.dovertn.com/departments/fire.php
According to Dover’s website: The Town of Dover contracts with the Stewart County Fire & Rescue and is a volunteer department. The Department has two fully equipped engines and one equipped rescue/service truck. The present ISO rating is Class 5.
The Fire Department responds to all types of of emergencies including fire, vehicle crashes, search and rescue calls, weather related calls and all other calls as needed. Besides fire suppression and rescue services, the fire department is actively involved in community events like the Halloween Festival and Eagle Fest.
Dover Fire Department
625 Donelson Parkway
P.O. Box 447
Dover, TN 37058
(931) 232-5907
For Emergencies: 911
While I was the Chief of the Fire Department from 2010 to 2014, with the help of the Mayor and City Council, we completely revamped the Department to the current status of the time. A sizable amount of money was spent to accomplish this task. When I completed my tenure as Chief, we had 20 trained and loyal firefighters. The then City Manager and Deputy Chief of SCFR devised a plan to eliminate the Dover FD and provide service to the city and county using resources paid for by Town of Dover. I just set the record straight that we had adequate firefighters at the time the plan was devised.
I don’t agree with the cross training. It takes a lot of time and knowledge to be proficient in either field. Both the fire and police departments need to focus on their own fields.