Savings, Costs Of Fire District Legislation

This story was revised at 3 p.m. March 28.

If the General Assembly passes pending legislation to abolish the East Greenwich Fire District, paving the way for the town to establish a fire department in its place, what would that mean for EG taxpayers?

There would be some immediate savings as well as the probable loss of a significant long-term funding mechanism.

According to the legislation, current EGFD employees (both full and part time) would be retained. Those on contract, such as lawyer Scott Spear, accountant Kevin Hundley and the auditing company would not be retained. Scott Spear, the Fire District's lawyer, is budgeted at about $36,000 a year for his services.

The legal work would be done by the town's lawyer, who is not a town employee. Right now, the lawyer is Peter Clarkin, who earns $150,000 a year for his services. He said this week he had a "general sense" of what Spear does, but he has not talked to him in depth about the work. As to whether or not he would want to be compensated for the additional work, Clarkin said yes, he would, but he said that would be up to the Town Council.

Fire District accountant Kevin Hundley earns $36,000 a year. If the legislation is passed, fire accounting work would be done in house for no immediate increase in cost.

The Fire District spends $12,000 a year on audit expenses and about $90,000 on insurance costs.

The auditing work would be rolled into the work done for the town for some additional expense. The insurance cost would also be rolled into the town insurance cost, but Town Manager Bill Sequino told the Council he thought that would bring a savings of about $10,000.

Another expense that would be saved is $1,000 yearly stipend offered to each Fire District Commissioner. 

Billing and payroll are already handled by the Town of East Greenwich, so there would be no change there.

One revenue stream the Fire District has had over the years that would probably not continue under the town's governance would be the imposition of commercial impact fees (fees charged to developers of commercial developments). Those fees have been the basis for a fund used for replacing vehicles and other equipment and, this year, for tests related to buying the parcel of land at Post Road and Cedar Avenue that may one day hold a new fire station.

The EGFD's impact fee fund stands at around $481,000 now. Council President Michael Isaacs has said that money will be safeguarded for the fire district/department. But it will not be readily replenished without the imposition of commercial impact fees. (The EGFD also has $900,000 in the capital improvements fund.)

The Town of East Greenwich does not impose commercial impact fees and the Council reiterated that position a year ago, when it refused to approve a proposal from the Planning Department that included them.

"I do think one of the things we need to do in this town is to try to take some of the burden off of homeowners and one way to do that is to develop more commercial properties," Council President Michael Isaacs said at the time. "I don’t want to create a perception that we’re opposed to business."

Earlier this week, Isaacs said, "We have to step back and look at what is in the best long-term interest of the town. The state is already perceived as anti-business enough. We certainly don’t want to contribute to that in East Greenwich."

If there's not enough money for a purchase outright of a new piece of equipment, the town would have to go out to bond to raise the money. As of now, the Fire District has no debt.

The bills in the state House and Senate are expected to be heard in late April.