SALEM TOWNSHIP – Fire Chief Steven Viles says he has at least three volunteer firefighters available during the day to cover the township if an emergency comes up.
There are 10 members of the Salem Fire Association, he said, and most of them are available on nights and weekends. Many of them work out of town during the day.
“We do have mutual aid,” Viles said Friday.
The fire association went from being a holding company for Kingfield Fire Department to being incorporated as its own department and funded by Franklin County about two years ago, Viles said. That opened up the department to grants and other opportunities that were not available as a holding company, Viles said.
The crew is all-volunteer, he said, and the department has two trucks.
“It cost me $5,000 a year,” Viles said, out of his own pocket for expenses incurred to be a firefighter. He added that fire protection and safety are the focus, not money.
“Things are going fine,” Viles said, of the association.
They’ve responded to two or three mutual aid calls recently and were first on the scene at a barn fire in Phillips about a month ago.
Viles said his department is willing to help Freeman Township with its fire service.
But the closest departments to Freeman Ridge in the township are Kingfield and New Portland, he said.
Kingfield selectmen rejected a contract last week with Franklin County, which oversees unorganized territory contracts, to provide first responder fire protection to Freeman Ridge because the structural fire agreement amount was reduced by 80 percent to $1,500 and was done without consulting them.
Selectmen say that the town invested in equipment and a fire station, and the county is responsible for a percentage of that investment.
The town had factored in the $5,500 that it had received annually into its budget and, though the figure was confirmed several times prior to Kingfield’s town meeting, commissioners reduced the amount of the agreement in mid-March.
County commissioners say that Kingfield should have been aware its stipend would be reduced after the Salem Fire Association was organized and was primary responder to Salem. Kingfield used to be primary responder to Salem Township.
Comments are no longer available on this story