RUMFORD — When faced with paying $65,000 to repair the ladder truck or buying a new or used one, selectmen offered Chief Bob Chase another option — get rid of it.

Chase was asked to create a plan to rely on mutual-aid towns of Mexico, Dixfield and Andover for ladder truck needs. The fire chief is to present that plan at the board’s March 15 meeting.

Previously, selectmen OK’d Chase spending $11,000 to repair a turntable rotational problem on the 22-year-old ladder truck that was bought used eight years ago from Connecticut for $180,000.

However, Greenwood Emergency Vehicles Inc. soon found other major problems totaling an estimated $62,000 to fix that rendered the truck out of service.

On learning this, Chase said he asked Greenwood to stop and perform a bumper-to-bumper inspection to determine the extent of needed repairs.

That search revealed several thousand dollars of additional work that might extend the truck’s life up to six years if completed, he said.

Chase gave the board five options. The first was to complete $65,000 in repairs, he said. A full truck refurbishment costing an estimated $100,000 to $300,000 was the second option for maybe 10 more years of use.

“The big problem with the truck is corrosion and we’ve got 22 years of road corrosion on this thing,” Chase said.

“You wash it too much. You wash it every day,” Selectman Chairman Greg Buccina said.

“We don’t wash it enough,” Chase said. “We wash it to get the salt off, but the problem is there’s underside corrosion to the chassis and we don’t have that ability to clean that.”

“In my opinion, we bought a 14-year-old truck and the best 20 years of life was used out of it before we bought it,” he said.

“It was used in the big city and ran a lot in 14 years, and certainly from a maintenance standpoint, they got the low maintenance costs out of it.”

The third option was to explore the used ladder truck market for a truck that could maybe last eight years, before getting into high maintenance costs.

The fourth option was to buy a used truck in the $450,000 range, that might last 15 years. His final option was to spend $750,000 for a new 30-year truck.

“I have another option,” Buccina said. “My option would be to get rid of it.”

On learning from Chase that the 110-foot-long ladder was used eight times in the last 10 months for aerial suppression of large fires and chimney fires, and carries tools they can’t carry on other trucks, Buccina suggested regionalizing with area towns that have ladder trucks.

“To me, this would be a great opportunity to regionalize a service,” he said.

Buccina said he wouldn’t support fixing or replacing the ladder truck. Instead, he asked why Rumford can’t work with Andover, Dixfield or Mexico for ladder truck service to save costs.

“We absolutely can,” Chase said. “This is not virgin territory. This has been thought of and discussed in depth.”

Mexico and Dixfield have 1975 ladder trucks, officials with those departments said Tuesday. Mexico’s ladder extends 75 feet and Dixfield has a 100-foot ladder.

Chase said he expects Mexico and Dixfield to soon replace those trucks, and that Andover’s truck currently lacks a valid certification and needs repairs.

“We have been using Mexico’s,” Chase said.

Buccina then told Chase he’d vote against repairing or replacing Rumford’s ladder truck.

Chase said Rumford needs to have a plan in place that provides the town with a reliable ladder before this summer. The board told him to draft a plan.

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