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Mission Statement |
InceptionThrough the efforts of the Board of County Commissioners, and a committee from the Polk County Mutual Aid Fire Association, a Fire ordinance was developed for the unincorporated areas of the County that would assure structure fire calls be answered throughout the county. The ordinance would provide for a fire fee being charged, and these funds would be used to provide operating monies for existing volunteer fire departments. It would also help create new departments to provide fire protection in areas not presently protected by any fire department. The ordinance also provided for the County to enter into contracts with municipalities throughout the county to cover areas immediately surrounding their boundaries, therefore providing assurance that all structure fires in the unincorporated area would be responded to by a fire department The Board of County Commissioners placed a referendum on the general election ballot in 1974. The referendum to charge a fire protection fee on all structures in unincorporated Polk County passed by a two to one margin. After the referendum was passed, the Commission approved the construction and staffing Of an emergency vehicle repair facility and began repairing, refurbishing and fabricating fire apparatus for use by volunteer fire departments. Eleven new mini-pumpers, and two new full size pumpers were purchased and placed in service. One hundred fifty sets of firefighter protective clothing, forty thousand feet of fire hose, ladders, breathing apparatus, nozzles, and fire extinguishers were purchased. A two-way FM communications system was established and put into service, countywide. New fire stations were built, some existing fire stations were repaired, and volunteer fire departments were formed. ProgressPolk County Fire Department currently has thirty stations. Thirteen of these are manned on a twenty-four hour basis, seven are manned on an eight-hour basis, and ten are all volunteer. The current authorized manning level is one hundred forty career, twenty part time and three hundred five volunteer personnel. The FY 97-98 annual budget was $10,869,239. In FY 1997-98, Polk County Fire Department responded to 11,935 alarms. The Board of County Commissioners authorized the Insurances Services
Office (ISO) study in 1995. The County had multiple ISO ratings throughout
the unincorporated area. It was the goal of this study to bring all County
Volunteer Departments under one authority by consolidation and one ISO
class rating for the entire County. This was not fully accomplished until
September 1998, when ISO issued a new improved class rating of 5/9.
Future
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