ROSSFORD, Ohio — Rossford City Council showed their support for the city's fire department Monday, approving several ordinances to help them get equipment and increase staffing.
Dozens packed Monday's meeting to support their fire department. Several said they have been understaffed and with second rate equipment for a long time. They wanted their elected officials to do right by their firefighters.
"I am so frustrated and everybody in this room has a responsibly to fix that," Jeni Hill, a Rossford Firefighters wife said. "I mean, it's great what we're doing and it's great that it's going forward and we're able to maintain the small town kind of feel with all these great new developments coming in but if you're not going to keep people safe what's the point?"
Rachel Eckle spoke from experience. She said she recently expereinced the fire department's challenges when a neighbor child was unresponsive. She performed CPR and while Rossford Fire arrived to help, they didn't have the proper help, leaving child waiting for close to 20 minutes.
"Next time what if it's your parents," Eckel asked. "What if it's your child, what if it's your grandchild? Do you think a 20 minute response time is okay?"
After much discussion, council looked at four ordinances. The first, they did not pass. It was to fix the 21-year-old fire engine that has been sitting broken in their lot for the past year. While there was some debate about if it could be useful in the meantime, council voted 5-2 to not fix it.
While they aren't fixing that truck, they did unanimously approve the purchase of a demo engine totaling about $540,000, according to the fire chief. Chief Drouard said this vehicle could have been purchased by any other department at any moment and will save them more than $100,000. This vote allows the department to commit to the truck now and get it into service sooner.
Council also approved funds from the existing levy to purchase additional gear for the department from helmets, to boots, breathing apparatuses and more.
The council continued their commitment to the department Monday night, approving nearly $40,000 from the general fund to increase staffing so the department will be manned 24-hours for the first time in it's history. Rather than work 8 hours, now firefighters will work 12-hour day shifts with 12-hour overnight on call hours. This makes Rossford more competitive to other neighboring departments and helps them better serve the area, according to Chief Drouard.
"It's a big morale-booster to our fire department with the new equipment and the increased staffing which will help us deliver better service to our community," Chief Drouard said.
Monday's vote to approve the purchase of the new engine comes before the levy vote for the same thing. Essentially, council approved the funds in hopes the levy does pass and the department will repay the funds.
The additional hours for staffing were only approved for the remainder of 2019, but the chief said that's something they will be looking at in their budget in the future.
Fire department officials said they've seen a lot of support so far for their levy requests, but they will hold an informational meeting on October 24 at 7 p.m. at the IBEW in Rossford for residents to learn more.