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DRAFT DRAFT The Regular Monthly Meeting of the Sourdough Rural Fire District was called to order by Acting Chairman Steve Dayhuff at 7:35 PM December 15, 2003 . Trustees present: Dayhuff, Larimer, Bachman. Trustees absent: Kraft, Geddes. Also present was Chief Crandell, COC Kandy Rose, Kyle Ecker, Allied Engineering and Jesse Armitage, Rae Board. • Agenda Review: COC Rose suggested the "Other business as warranted" item may be an illegal category under Montana Law. Bachman will ask counsel to clarify. Under that category is a request from the Gallatin County Election Office for a resolution finding it necessary to elect a number (to be determined) of trustee(s) at an election on May 4, 2004 . The Resolution will be placed on the agenda for the January regular meeting. Also under this item is a request by staff bookkeeper Mueller to move the January meeting to the 4 th Monday, since he will be unable to present a timely financial report at a regular 3 rd Monday meeting. The trustees directed, by consensus, that the regular January meeting be noticed on that date. The remainder of the agenda would be addressed in order. • Minutes of the Regular Meeting of November 17 were presented. Dayhuff moved for approval and Bachman seconded. Passed and placed in the record. • Minutes of the Special Meeting of November 24 were presented. Dayhuff moved for approval and Bachman seconded. Passed and placed in the record. • The Treasurer's Report was presented by Bachman, in lieu of Geddes. After review, it was decided to defer action on the report until after the Chief's Facility and Apparatus Report. • Chief's SFD Operations Report is included in the record. The Facilities and apparatus section is covered in a separate agenda item (next). It was noted that SFD has been awarded $49,000 through a FEMA grant for fire fighter safety equipment. We will provide a $7,000 match. This grant will allow the District to direct current category funding to other projects. • Chief's Facility and Apparatus Budget Report: A memorandum from Trustee Geddes regarding the report had been distributed electronically to all trustees and the Chief, was acknowledged and entered into the record. Chief Crandell presented a "punch list" itemizing to the best of his knowledge, in consultation with Allied Engineering, showing a total additional cost estimate to complete the Cottonwood Station of $128,867. The SFD share of this is 1/2 or about $67,400. Some costs were covered by payment noted in the financial report. Final cost estimate will be presented at the January meeting. Armitage stated that Rae cash flow will cover their share of the cost overrun. The financial report indicates a cash balance of $191,682 which includes $110,000 from the sale of E-7 ($15,000 due less defect costs) and $151,101.03 from November tax revenue. Occupancy will be in 4 - 6 weeks. At this point Bachman moved for approval of the financial report and payment of warrants > $300. Dayhuff seconded. Passed and placed in the record. The discussion turned to the assembly of E-7-2, currently in Spokane . Chief Crandell had authorized 70 additional hours of work at $65/hr. It is estimated that complete assembly will take 1080 hours and that total additional cost will be $90,000 including materials. Completion would be prior to summer. Truck would be equipped from current Rae surplus hose, ladders and already purchased SFD safety equipment. Chief Crandell referenced the Facility and Apparatus Improvement Project Report presented at the 11/24/03 Special Meeting. Based upon total estimated revenue to the end of the fiscal year of $453,000, the board felt that apparatus assembly could proceed. Larimer moved for continuation of the assembly of E-7-2 at General Fire Apparatus in Spokane with a stop limit of 1080 hours and a cost limit of $90,000. Bachman seconded. Motion passed. Further detail on apparatus costs and assembly schedule will be presented at the January meeting. • Recruitment and Retention. Trustee Dayhuff presented a memo to the board on Ideas on Recruitment and Retention that was entered into the record. The ideas are a tiered system of compensation that would cost on the order of $27-30,000/yr. After some discussion, the trustees and chief agreed that this cost was fundable, and pledged to continue consideration of the idea. Chief Crandell reiterated the commitment to district service through training and call response. The trustees agreed with his assessment that the District community was demographically difficult to recruit from. He again stated that fire prevention planning review of subdivision applications was time consuming. The trustees made a suggestion that the developers be charged an engineering level consulting fee for such reviews. The Chief will investigate this possibility through counsel. Bachman requested greater detail in the run reports to indicate incident location by street/road name (not number location), time of incident, staffing level and duration. This information will be supplied by Dispatch center in data format, and will aid in analyzing recruitment and retention concerns. • Executive Limitation re. Budget Report. It was decided by consensus that this topic will be included in the January evaluation of the Chief, which is mandated by the governance policy adopted by the Trustees. Some discussion ensued regarding convening in executive session during this evaluation process. Larimer moved that the Trustees conduct the evaluation in executive session. Bachman seconded. Passed. Bachman was directed to ask counsel about notice format for the executive session. • By-law revision; schedule for review: Bachman was directed to contact counsel and ask that the by-laws be reviewed over a reasonable time frame. He will provide the electronic document that Geddes had prepared early last year. • Other business as warranted. A letter from Matt Pace requesting copies of minutes for the years 2001, 2002 and 2003 was noted. The Chief will forward to counsel, and will advise Mr. Pace that the minutes he seeks are on the SFD web site. (Bachman will review the site to insure all minutes are included and will post any that are missing.) The meeting was adjourned at 10:30 PM Submitted for approval at the January 26, 2004 regular meeting.
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