By Geoffrey Wertime, Staff Writer
CHESTERFIELD — The defeated 2009 budget for Fire District 1 was cut by more than 10 percent after a long discussion at a special Township Committee meeting Monday.
Nearly 20 people, many of them fire commissioners or firefighters, attended the meeting where the Township Committee unanimously voted to cut a tax point, or $50,000, from the $490,261 budget, which failed by a vote of 69-58 last month.
That budget would have brought about an increase of 1.2 cents per $100 of assessed property value over last year’s tax rate of 9.6 cents. For the owner of a house valued at last year’s township average of $462,568, that would have meant a bill of about $444.10. Under the revised budget, officials said the new tax rate would be about a penny less than that originally proposed, but could not confirm the number immediately.
Before coming to a decision, the committee considered ways to save on the district’s staff and insurance policy, the possibility of merging the township’s two fire districts and canceling the order of a new $630,000 firetruck, which passed 77-66 in a referendum in the summer.
The majority of the reduction came from slashing the amount paid for fire hydrant rental from $75,000 to $45,000. The rest came from eliminating the $20,000 originally planned as a reserve for future capital outlays.
Much of the meeting focused on the cost of hydrant rental, and those present agreed the district has been paying for hydrants that are the responsibility of developers in the township. After much discussion, the committee and fire commissioners agreed the district is paying for 105 hydrants but are only responsible for 88.
Standing in for Township Attorney John C. Gillespie at the meeting, Elizabeth Garcia said developers are supposed to pay for hydrants until they dedicate the relevant roads to the township.
The legal evidence Chesterfield has, she continued, should be enough to get the developers to take on the payments.
While the size of these payments is not yet clear, Fire District 1 accountant John Maley, of Phoenix Advisors in Bordentown, said the budget should be able to handle the $30,000 cut to hydrant rental payments.
The committee expressed some frustration with the commission for having overlooked the matter, which Committeeman Larry Durr said first came up two years ago.
The commissioners said they were unaware they were not responsible for the payments and had lacked the necessary information to determine which roads belonged to whom.
”They could flimflam us,” said Fire Commissioner Stanley Lewis. “We have no way of knowing.”
Earlier this week, the district’s career firefighters were confirming the locations of the hydrants for which they have been billed.
During public comment and the discussion portions of the meeting, a few residents took the opportunity to voice their concerns about the way the district is run.
One of them was Ellisdale Road resident Chip Katona. Among his many suggestions was the district lay off a firefighter, a suggestion, which elicited raised voices until Mayor Michael Hlubik called for order.
Commissioner Brent Dickinson said the district needs four firefighters on a call in order to have two people inside a burning building and two people outside as per standards set by the National Fire Protection Association.
”(Mr. Katona) is correct that it’s not a requirement,” he said. “But it is a guideline that is set by the NFPA, which is backed by generations of research in the field, which have let us know that ‘two in, two out’ is the minimum we should work with in order to sustain the life of everyone on the scene.”
The committee also criticized the commission for its lack of investigation into a merger with District 2 even after receiving the results of a consolidation study just over a year ago.
”It’s extremely unfortunate we’ve spent two years here and gone absolutely nowhere,” Mr. Durr said. “I have no idea what the best thing is to do either, but we’ve had two independent reports done, one by residents of the community and then another completely independent with participation from both fire companies, that recommend the same thing. I guess the thing is you five have decided you don’t want to do this.”
The commissioners said they had expected to take direction form the township on the matter, but the committee said it was not its responsibility.
”I don’t know enough about what it takes to provide fire safety in this town,” said Deputy Mayor Brian Kelly. “But I think if you got the two commission boards together, you should be able to arrive at decisions about that.”
Chesterfield Fire District 1 covers the Crosswicks section of the township as well as part of Hamilton. Its budget was the only one in the Northern Burlington County area not approved by voters in the area’s five fire elections Feb. 21.

