Separate contract will be negotiated for any major fire vehicle purchases
The DeWitt Town Board and East Syracuse Village Board have agreed to a contract that will ensure the DeWitt north-town fire district has coverage for 2017.
The $900,000 agreement calls for half the contract to be paid by Feb. 1, 2017 and the second half to be paid by May 1, 2017. This is the same amount that was negotiated Dec. 14, 2015 after nearly six months of dispute over alleged unsubstantiated funds in 2015 between the municipalities.
“We didn’t have the mechanisms to go forward with an alternative plan for 2017 and all parties seemed to be ok with this contract,” said DeWitt Supervisor Ed Michalenko at the Oct. 17 meeting. “Maybe in the future the town can look into an alternative [fire protection] plan.”
The DeWitt north-town fire district includes the Park Hill, Franklin Park, Parkwood and Collamer neighborhoods. The East Syracuse Fire Department (ESFD) is contracted to provide fire protection services to that area for the town of DeWitt.
The 2017 contract was approved by the DeWitt Town Board at their Oct. 17 board meeting, and by the East Syracuse Board of Trustees at an Oct. 24 special meeting.
As part of the contract, East Syracuse Mayor Robert Tackman said the ESFD will be required to notify the village and the town of any purchases greater than $50,000.
“I had hoped that we would be able to renegotiate a higher contract amount,” said Tackman at the Oct. 24 meeting. “But the fire department has gone through some change-ups and things seemed to have settled now and the chief is happy with this amount knowing he can run the department with it.”
In the near future, the ESFD hopes to purchase a new rescue truck, which will cost around $1 million, but Tackman said that will be negotiated with DeWitt separately to ensure all parties are giving their fair share and to create transparency in the process.
In June 2015, a dispute over the contract was started when Michalenko said he believed the town had paid nearly $1.8 million more than it should have for the fire protection services in the north-town district, and said he wanted to have a look at the fire department’s expenses. He said then that since 2009, the town has paid about $6.4 million ($1.2 million per year) in payments to the East Syracuse Fire Department and the town is supposed to share the costs of fire protection with the village on an 80/20 split. This 80/20 split should have resulted in about $4.6 million in payments by the town, which is why Michalenko said the town believes they have been overpaying for fire protection.
After months of negotiations, DeWitt and East Syracuse representatives were finally able to reach an agreement in December 2015 on a contract where DeWitt would pay the ESFD $900,000 per year.
Despite the formation of a committee made up of representatives from the ESFD, DeWitt and East Syracuse to negotiate future contracts being part of the original agreement, no such committee has been formed, though there is interest from all parties in doing so.
“I support continuing the contract to give us another year to figure things out. My overall goal is to be able to work together to get a multi-year contract,” said Tackman.
