Midway fire responds to criticism about budget
Part one of three

I was appalled by the vicious attacks made by people who were misinformed, made illogical conclusions, and pure fabrications about the status of the District.

There are two separate and distinct issues with the Fire Assessment fee and Amendment 1, neither depends upon the other.

The Fire Assessment Fee was to be used to build Station 3 and hire employees to man it. Failure to pass the issue does NOT affect current operations. If Amendment 1 failed to pass, current operations would not have been affected. However, since Amendment 1 passed and according to the initial report from the [Santa Rosa County Property Appraiser], using 2007 numbers, the estimated total fire taxable value is $1,560,189,594 resulting in a shortfall in revenue for [Fiscal Year] 2009 of $603,471. The reduction in property value is due to applying the $50,000 homestead exemption. Currently, and in passed years the district received its funding based on the assessed value not recognizing credit for the homestead exemption.

Below are some quotes taken from letters to the editor and newspaper columns. I have attached to them facts correcting misinformation, fabrication, and clarification of various statements.

Comments Regarding Financial Matters:

"...demonstrating some internal constraints and attempting to rectify their own financial dishevel…"

"Now the district has no financial means to retain these employees. Unfortunately, lack of foresight and excessive expenditures combined with the decrease growth rate have created a financial disaster for the fire district."

"Chief and a Board of Commissioners that has failed to acknowledge their role in this financial disaster"

"I feel confident that if the Midway Fire District would acknowledge their role in this unfortunate situation and make some internal concessions,"

Fact: Not true. The "financial disaster" is due to the passage of Amendment 1, which cut $603,471 from next year's revenue, not the failure of the Fire Assessment Fee referendum. The Fire Assessment Fee was for future expansion not current operations. During the years of "growing the department" I recognized only four names who had attended budget and other meetings making decisions to build Station 1, rebuilding Station 2, replacing two old fire trucks and one service truck. Those were the former fire commissioners. During that time and, since, budgeting has been done with a 10 year plan. When the new assessment report came out and showed a decrease in value for the [Fiscal Year] 2008 Budget Year, we provided no increase in salaries and, also, budgeted to release two firefighters as the end of the 1st quarter. At no time did this board or previous boards approve budgets that reflected any problems meeting the forecasts. Property values averaged increasing 9.02 percent annually from Jan. 1, 1993 through 2005. It is beyond me how can any one make statements such as those above with no knowledge of the workings of the district.