05-08-2023 Council Work Session Packet

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Orono Fire Needs Assessment 51 | Page overall service to Orono residents and reduce inefficiencies in emergency response. In addition, the department and its members will have access to the rest of the Orono staff and the administrative support services it can provide. • Disadvantages (Cons). A key disadvantage to this COA is that the investment in capital is too low to sustain the fleet and meet NFPA standards. This COA does not establish nor realize and improvement in emergency response. The response is likely to remain at a Rural level in our increasingly suburban and urban community. Further in this COA with its cost distribution formula Orono residents disproportionately resource the department. This COA is dependent on both Orono and Long Lake coming to a mutually agreeable agreement on the transfer of the department which has so far, since 2017 been unsuccessful. 6.2 COA 2: Taxable Fire District/Joint Powers Agreement • Description. This COA looks at Orono joining a future Fire District or JPA Department. It uses a conceptual district from a Future Fire Services Meeting Presentation. That conceptual district includes the cities of Corcoran, Greenfield, Independence, Long Lake, Loretto, Maple Plain, Medina, Minnetonka Beach, Orono, Wayzata, and Woodland. It also includes the current fire departments of Long Lake, Loretto/Hammel, Maple Plain and Wayzata. This COA uses an Ad Valorum (property Value) tax formula for distribution of costs. • Cost. To estimate a cost for this COA the current operating budgets of the subject departments were combined. In addition, it was assumed the capital needs of all the departments was about the same as LLFDs so a sustainable capital need was calculated. The costs were then distributed based on the subject communities’ tax capacities. Based on these calculations the annual cost to Orono would be $1,910,000. The average cost to Orono households would be $597 per year. Moving to a Duty Crews staffing structure would likely raise that cost to $2,759,000 or an average of $725 per Orono household. • Advantages (pros). Advantages of this COA would be possible capital cost avoidance in the future and a larger pool of fire fighters to draw from which might offset recruiting and retention trends. • Disadvantages (Cons). Cost burden disproportionate to services provided. Using current call volumes of the fire departments and cities included in the district, Orono would only use approximately 22% of the service but fund 34% of the budget. As one of 10 municipalities Orono would have very little local control. Improvements in service standards, capital investment and operations would require agreement between the cities served or worse yet convincing an independent board.