Fire chiefs, trustees agree to adjust Deep Creek fire districts
Jun. 21—GOOSE LAKE — Inside Goose Lake's fire station on Wednesday night, Deep Creek Township's trustees and the fire chiefs of Charlotte, Preston, Miles and Goose Lake worked nearer to restructuring their fire districts.
"Let's move forward, set these lines. I think we're so close," Clinton County Treasurer Dustin Johnson encouraged. "We want to see you guys work together. I think everybody expects that in the community. Please do that."
Redistricting conversations, County Board of Supervisors Chairman Jim Irwin stated in a June 21 email, were initially prompted by a car accident that had occurred within Miles Fire Department's current district in Goose Lake last fall.
"There was a car accident where a teenage driver was thrown from her vehicle and laid in the ditch for approximately 17 minutes," Irwin wrote. "It may have been longer."
Goose Lake Fire Chief Kevin Cain stated on Wednesday, "This isn't a discussion of a department being inadequate. It's just about timing."
Proposed changes to fire district borders that resulted from Wednesday's meeting would move the Charlotte district border north, as well as the southern borders of the Miles and Preston fire districts, resulting in a larger southern area of Deep Creek becoming part of the Goose Lake fire district.
Per guidance provided to the trustees Wednesday by Clinton County Attorney Mike Wolf, formal action on the proposed changes is to be taken at a meeting held at a later date.
Following formal action, affected addresses would need to be updated in a Geographic Information Systems, or GIS, dispatching and call routing system which Interim Communications Director Lt. Scott Reyhons said could possibly take several months to complete.
The date in which the changes in communications could be completed, County Auditor Eric Van Lancker suggested, would be a good date for updated mutual aid contracts to go into effect reflecting the district border changes as well as how those changes will impact township levies that provide funding for the fire departments.
"At the end of the day, it doesn't matter who gets called out, as long as we all respond, and we all work together, and we all get the same thing done," Miles Fire Chief Paul Maze said. "It doesn't matter who's getting the money for it, as long as whoever is in need of whatever service that needs to be done — I don't care, call all four."
