City Council outlines buying new fire truck

During its work session, the City Council discussed purchasing a fire truck to replace an aging one the city has on loan from Benton County.

The Pierce Class A custom pumper, priced at $464,346 with a prepurchase discount, would take the place of a 2005 International truck, council member and mayor pro tem John Flynn said. The 2005 truck, he said, is on loan from the county at no cost to the city aside from maintenance, but that maintenance is becoming expensive.

Council member Jim Wozniak said the truck is one of several the county purchased and distributed to several volunteer departments and small departments with similar agreements.

“They weren’t the best trucks,” he said, “and we’re talking 10 or more years ago.”

Deputy Fire Chief Bryan Wolfgang said that the new truck would be assigned to Station 3, located on Glasgow Road.

The old truck, he said, is not a proper fire truck, but a commercial truck that was outfitted with pumping apparatus. While it is a capable truck, he said, it wasn’t built for the kind of use the department puts it through.

“It’s more designed for a volunteer department that runs a couple hundred calls a year in it, not like we use it,” he said.

In the past month, he said, $1,600 has gone into upkeep.

Additionally, he said, if the department owns its truck it can control its fleet more fully. As of right now, he said, that truck is at the mercy of Benton County.

“The county could call us tomorrow and pull that truck from us just like that,” Wolfgang said. In that scenario, he said, the department would need to use a 2003 Kenmore truck it has as a backup, meaning the city would not have a backup available.

If the department purchases the new truck, he said, the county truck can be used as a reserve unit while the new truck will function as the primary unit.

Additionally, he said, the department can save roughly $22,000 by prepurchasing the truck. He does not anticipate issues with Pierce, he said, because the department has had solid dealings with them in the past.

To make the purchase, staff attorney Jason Kelley said, the City Council would need to approve both the purchase itself and the financing. After shopping around for a 5-year loan, he said, most interest rates came in in the low 2 percent range, with the lowest at 2.09 percent. It’s important to note, he said, that these rates are not set in stone and may change before a contract can be signed.

Additionally, he said, loan payments will begin immediately, but the city will have to wait up to one year to receive its new, made-to-order truck.

“We have these trucks built,” he said. “There’s no truck sitting there on the lot when we go to buy.”

A bond, he said, will also be taken out at a cost of $2,900 to the city, which will protect the city if, for some reason, the truck never gets delivered.