Here’s my take on the Tillamook Fire District operating levy as a former volunteer and after a brief time as a board member.
Tillamook Fire District has a dedicated group of volunteers who answer the call three or more times a day on average. If you need them, they will be there for you.
The underlying problem at Tillamook Fire District is that the district is under-funded. Other districts in the county have 2x, 3x, or even almost 4x TFD’s property tax rate. TFD’s rate was higher for a while while the new apparatus (2 engines and a ladder truck) from the mid 1990’s bond was paid off. By the way, the mid-1990’s was 30 years ago.
TFD personnel, both paid and volunteer, have taken a great deal of pride in maintaining what they have. Whether it’s building up trucks or command rigs to save money, re-siding the fire station largely with in-house labor, or other efforts, TFD has been careful with our taxpayer money.
The last few years have been difficult. If you’ve followed the news or have friends in the department, you know how difficult it has been. The root of many of these problems was lack of money and resulting poor leadership decisions. The long term outcome was a culture of conflict, with people on various sides of the many issues often trying to do what they thought was right, but in the end resulting in conflict that weakens the whole organization.
Now, it’s true that we can sit back and say that TFD needs to get their house in order before we give them more money. But I would argue that without more funding, it will be impossible to sustain the service we have today, much less rebuild the department. We can either pay more for TFD and get back to a high performing fire district, or we can live (or die) with less service and pay the extra money to insurance companies when our ISO (insurance company) rating drops.
I’m sorry if there aren’t all the details you might want to hear, but I’m limited in what I can say because of my time as a board member.
I voted yes. I hope you will, too.
Jack Mulder
Tillamook, Oregon
