Middletown and Monroe Ohio Discuss Combining Dispatch, Fire Stations

Discussions are very early, but officials from the two cities are talking about a number of ways they can improve fire and medical response times within their borders. They're also discussing combining their fire dispatching services. Further down the road, the cities even may work on similar arrangements with their police services.

Middletown City Manager Doug Adkins and Monroe City Manager William Brock recently sat down to discuss "almost integrating our fire departments and our (fire) dispatch," as Adkins described it recently to Middletown City Council.

"We are literally at step 1/2 of 10, if that," Adkins said, emphasizing how preliminary the talks are.

Monroe has "a lot of firefighters, but not a lot of command staff," Adkins said. "We have a fair chunk of command staff, and not as many firefighters. One of the things that's attractive to both of us is utilizing each other's excess capacity."

The two cities now have mutual aid agreements, but are looking to create an "automatic aid" agreement. Under such an arrangement, when there's a fire in Middletown, for example, Monroe firefighters would automatically be sent to the scene at the same time as Middletown crews. Currently there is a lag time.

"The conversation we're having is, 'If there's a fire in Middletown, send us a fire truck with firemen, and we'll command-staff it," Adkins said. "If you have a fire in Monroe, our deputy chief, whoever's on there, will pop in his pickup truck, go flying down Cincinnati-Dayton Road, and we'll assume command of the fire until one of their command staff can get on site. And it's mutually beneficial for both."

Monroe Fire Chief John Centers says having a common fire dispatchers operation would make simultaneous sending of emergency crews possible.

"If you're dispatched by the same entity, they can be dispatched at the same exact time," Centers said. "If you're not dispatched by the same entity, typically a radio transmission or a phone call would have to be made at the time of the call to tell them that you need to send an engine over here for a fire, or an ambulance for an auto accident, or whatever the case may be."

Brock said it's a matter of trying to improve emergency response times while operating efficiently.

"Two jurisdictions shouldn't have fire stations right next to each other," Brock said. "We need to continue to work together and explore what the best route is to work together to keep all our costs down and not duplicate efforts right next door to each other."

Middletown Public Safety Director David VanArsdale said stations that could be jointly staffed include Monroe's facility on Ohio 4 close to southwest Middletown. Another is a possible future station in southeastern Middletown.

The idea is not to save money by cutting staff, Brock said.

"I don't think either department can support any additional layoffs, either in Middletown or any layoffs here," Brock said. "We're a growing community. We're looking at our staffing needs throughout the city as we continue to grow. So that shouldn't be an issue.

"But as we grow, the question is not to combine and reduce, it's how do we grow?" he added. "And if it's growing together, if that's the right thing to do, that will come out of this discussion."

Centers said an automatic aid agreement could help firefighters operate more quickly and safely during the first 10 minutes of fires, when injuries are most likely.

At a fire scene, crews need a commander, a safety officer and an accountability person who tracks all the firefighters and their whereabouts at the scene, Centers said.

"I don't think either of our departments has the capability to fill those roles in the first 10 minutes of a fire," he said. "So we would be sharing command staff back and forth. We would be potentially sharing safety staff and accountability officers back and forth, and that's getting those people on the scene within the first few minutes, because that's where it makes the difference. That's when people typically get hurt -- in the first 10 minutes of a fire."

VanArsdale said more collaboration may happen further down the line.

"We're doing a lot with Monroe now, and I could see this extending into both public safety forces, where we work more, not only with Monroe fire but also Monroe police," VanArsdale said. "As a slightly larger department than Monroe, we have some things we can offer, and if it makes sense for their chief to combine some things with us, that would be something we would welcome."

Centers said if automatic fire aid happens between Middletown and Monroe, it may be a model for other governments to follow suit.

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