This new tax on property owners, if approved, will cost the owner of a $100,000 home $87.50 annually, according to the Butler County Auditor’s Office valuation calculations.
From 2013 to 2015, the city collectively subsidized the city fire department with $1.6 million. That subsidy is projected to be $1.2 million for 2016.
Continuing that subsidy would put the city “in a precarious situation for the long haul,” Finance Director Mary Hopton said.
Taxpayers already pay on a 4.65-mill levy voters approved 15 years ago. That levy will remain, and the Nov. 8 levy is needed largely in part to the 2011 cuts made in the state budget, according to the city’s fire chief.
“We lost revenues at no fault of our own due to tax allocations,” Fairfield Fire Chief Don Bennett said.
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A committee, Fairfield Citizens for Safety, has been assembled and an informational Facebook page has been established to help pass the levy. Bennett said the committee "is focused on educating the public on why we need the levy."
This levy will benefit the department’s emergency medical services more than anything, Bennett said, as 86 percent of the department’s emergency runs are medical-related. The department’s operation costs rise when there are more fire and EMS runs, and Bennett said “runs are on the rise.”
“This is an area where we want to maintain and continue the high level of services we’re providing and adapt to the changing needs of the community,” he said.
In 2000, the city had just more than 2,900 medical runs, and just last year the city made nearly 5,000 medical runs. In total, the city fire department makes around 6,000 fire and EMS runs annually — “give or take 100,” Bennett said.
Because of the growing need, response times are up. To ensure low response times, the current staffing of 13 fire personnel on duty during any given shift needs to increase by a couple people per shift.
And this levy will cover that increase, Bennett said.
“It is our hope, as much as we can calculate the future, that this will sustain our operations well into the future,” he said. Projections, barring any financial catastrophes or additional changes made by state law, show the levy will sustain the city at least for the next 10 years without the need of dipping into the general fund.
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