South Kingstown Fire Wardens Deem Cost to Cover Jerusalem "Fair"

Ashes flew from Jerusalem’s traditional Independence Day bonfire, set ablaze on the eve of the celebration in 1959 by a group of mischievous youngsters in the middle of the night, reads the historical account of the history of the relationship between the Union Fire District and the isolated Narragansett neighborhood.

Wind carried burning embers through the sleepy community and across unsuspecting doorsteps. Cinders fell and smoldered on the rooftops and porches of homes. For more than 30 minutes homeowners waited for firefighters from Narragansett’s Station No. 1 on Rodman Street to make their way around the Point Judith pond, through Wakefield and down Succotash Road to help them save their beachside cottages and squelch the flames of the untimely bonfire.

Although tragedy was avoided that night, Captain Emeritus Hilly Munson, a Union Fire District volunteer for the town of South Kingstown for since 1961, was a young man living in Jerusalem at the time. He said the bonfire scare brought to light the vulnerability of the neighborhood’s homes.

“They had a station there [in Jerusalem] at the time with an old 1927 Maxim Pumper, only when the call came in that night they couldn’t get the truck up over the hill,”  Munson said, referencing the steep stretch of road known today as Beach Row that the truck tried to climb. “After it took Point Judith more than 30 minutes to respond, people were wondering why the Snug Harbor Station, just a mile and a half down the road, didn’t come.”

A handshake agreement between the Snug Harbor Volunteer Fire Company on Bliss Road and the town of Narragansett sealed the deal shortly after that fateful night, and for a fee of $500 per year Snug Harbor would cover all calls to the village of Jerusalem.

Flash forward to 2011 and those same eight streets, now outfitted with about 150 homes, are still protected by South Kingstown’s all-volunteer Union Fire District for that same $500 per year fee.

Although the Snug Harbor Volunteer Fire Company heads over to Jerusalem for the standard false alarm calls and the occasional house fire, UFD Deputy Chief Steve Pinch said the calls rarely number more than a dozen annually. Compared with the 850 calls the district handled in 2010, he said the neighborhood isn’t a burden to the town's volunteer firefighters.

“We don’t do [Jerusalem’s] fire inspections, we don’t have to add equipment to cover that call area, we don’t need to add an engine,” he said. “It really hasn’t been a big drain on department resources.”

The Board of Fire Wardens, discussing the sum before its Monday night meeting, agreed.

“Many years ago [Narragansett’s] fire stations were strictly volunteer as well, so they asked Snug Harbor to respond to Jerusalem, it cuts response time,” said Warden Tony Ciccone. “When Snug Harbor became a part of the UFD in the early ’60s, the agreement carried over.”

While UFD administrator Bette Marco said the District’s budget is sustainable with the town's tax base, $500 a year to extend coverage to an area with an estimated $83.8 million worth of homes and property could net the district an additional $47,500 per year. South Kingstown residents pay $0.515 per $1,000 of assessed property value in addition to their property taxes every year to pay for the town’s fire services.

A mutual aid agreement between the two towns requires reciprocal help and coverage anyway, Warden Jeff Steere said. That means South Kingstown fire personnel either help fight fires in Narragansett or cover their stations while they respond to calls – and vice versa.

“We don’t need to stress the Narragansett tax base,” said Andy Boisvert, a Union Fire District warden. The Narragansett Fire Department, which pays for 32 full and part time firefighters as well as an administrative staff, came under scrutiny at Monday night’s Narragansett Town Council meeting when President Glenna Hagopian and councilman Christopher Wilkens expressed the department’s unsustainable cost to the taxpayers.

Its department costs residents of Narragansett more than $4.3 million annually. By contrast, South Kingstown's all-volunteer departments cost taxpayers just over $2 million and services about 2,200 more households.

Boisvert said the Narragansett Fire Department helps South Kingstown out as well by allowing UFD antennae to perch on their north end station so that South Kingstown’s dispatchers can carry out communication with the Middlebridge area.

“It’s not a big deal,” Boisvert said. “We help each other out.”