Burrillville fire district merger question to go to voters

BURRILLVILLE — A non-binding referenda on whether to consolidate the four fire districts in town into a separate and independent district will go before voters in the November election.

The Burrillville Town Council unanimously voted last Wednesday to bring the longstanding issue to voters by placing a non-binding referendum on the Nov. 6 ballot. n Councilman David J. Place brought the question forward, saying while voters will be asked to answer the t referendum, the results will be nonbinding.

A “yes” vote would mean voters favor consolidating the fire districts, while a “no” vote would mean they support the districts continuing as independent entities.

Merging the town’s fire districts has been a hot-button issue in town for years. There are four fire districts in town, including the Harrisville Fire District, Pascoag Fire District, Nasonville Fire Distirct, and Oakland-Mapleville Fire District. Fire districts are autonomous units of government within a city or town that normally exist for the purpose of providing fire protection and related services.

“This (ballot question) is just to get a pulse of what the people of Burrillville want,” Place said.

“I’ve been on the council since 2010 and have heard both sides of this issue,” Place said. “On the one side are the people who like the districts the way they are, while on the other side there are people who think the districts should be consolidated. But no one can give a clear answer on where the majority of the people of this community stand on this.”

“I can sit here and give arguments both for and against,” he added. “My personal opinions have swayed back and forth, but I think its important for the town’s longterm planning purposes to find out what the residents think.”

“I agree that the time is now,” added Council Raymond Trinque. “We’ve seen in other communities around the state where some of these fire districts have waited until there was a (financial) disaster, so to get ahead of it is a good idea. I think we should see if there is at least an interest out there to talk about this.”

The idea of merging the four fire districts in Burrillville has been raised off and on for more than 20 years, but has never amounted to anything more than talk because there has never been a formal consensus among the districts, some of which have vehemently spoken out against consolidation.

Several years ago, the Town Council sent out letters to the four districts to see if they would be interested in taking part in a study to determine the feasibility of either merging the districts or having the town take over fire service operations.

At that time, the Nasonville Fire District taxpayers authorized the chairwoman of the Nasonville Fire District Operating Committee to ask the town to hire a company to conduct an independent feasibility study to look at the effectiveness of the operations of the present fire and rescue services. The ultimate goal of the study would have been to determine the feasibility of either merging the four districts into a consolidated fire district, or having the town take over fire service operations.

Nasonville sent the later after taxpayers in Nasonville were told they would be facing a 20 percent tax increase that year.

The Town Council voted to defer Nasonville’s request to conduct the study until it gauged first whether there was interest and support from the town’s other three fire districts to even consider such a study. When contacted, Harrisville, Pascoag and Oakland-Mapleville Fire Districts all declined to participate.

There are more than 40 independent fire districts in 15 of the state’s 39 communities. In addition to Burrillville, Glocester, and Lincoln, there are fire districts in Foster, Charlestown, Scituate, Coventry, West Greenwich, Hopkinton, Richmond, Westerly, South Kingstown, Exeter and East Greenwich.

In a November 2010 referendum, Cumberland voters approved going to one fire service in 2013.