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75 Cents | Tuesday, Sept. 29, 2015 | sandmountainreporter.com
OBITUARIES | A3 Joan Horton Brock, Lynward Oneal Graben, Louise Oliver, Richard Wade Sansom, Peggy Genell Webb
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Meet the true first
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Double Bridges
Governor
to break
ground
Event marks end of
decades old quest
to replace bridges
Jay Beard
jbeard@sandmountainreporter.com
Gov. Robert Bentley is
coming to Albertville, Oct.
2, for a groundbreaking ceremony for the Red Mill
Double Bridges project.
The project, which will
cost an estimated 5.1 million, is the largest county
project in Marshall County
history.
“Everyone will have a
shovel and they will have a
ceremony,” said District 4
Commissioner Jessie
Swords. “This is great for
Marshall County.”
For Marshall County
Commission Chairman,
James Hutcheson, having
e Reporter | Bradley Roberts
Bryan Baker, of the Asbury Volunteer Fire Department, said a good pair of turnout gear could run the
department $2,000 or more.
See Bridge | A6
Volunteer ireighters seek funding, manpower
Bradley Roberts
broberts@sandmountainreporter.com
The Asbury Volunteer
Fire Department building sits quietly, uninhabited most hours of the
day, one-tenth of a mile
from Asbury High
School, just off of the
fork in Martling Gap
Road.
However, when a call
rings out to the 25 firemen on the VFD’s staff,
sending calls to pagers,
radios and through a $10
smartphone app to various android and Apple
devices, the men spring
into action.
The doors are released
to the five-bay garage
housing the department’s trucks and equipment, and the volunteers
roll out to answer the
call.
“We’ve got two registered (Emergency Medical Technicians), eight
first responders and 25
total firefighters,” said
Asbury Fire Chief Bryan
Baker.
Baker, who also runs
Asbury Farm Supply,
said the men arrive at
Volume 60, No. 114
Arrest
follows
wreck
Man lees earlymorning wreck
Bradley Roberts
broberts@sandmountainreporter.com
The cost to run the volunteer fire department quickly
adds up.
There are 17 volunteer fire
departments in Marshall
County, and while all are
unique in their own rights,
they all face one glaringly obvious problem: funding.
Albertville police arrested
a Boaz man over the weekend after he fled the scene
of a crash.
According to Assistant
Police Chief Maj. Jamie
Smith, police responded to
a call around 4 a.m. Sunday
after a car drove through an
intersection at Campbell
Street and Alabama 205 in
Albertville, careened off the
road and slammed into a
power pole.
Smith said the driver of
the 2002 Oldsmobile Silhouette, Vincent Galimore,
38, of Boaz, left the scene
of the crash as an un-named
passenger remained in the
front seat.
See Volunteers | A5
See Wreck | A6
e Reporter | Bradley Roberts
Asbury Fire Chief Bryan Baker said the department is currently surviving on donations from the community.
the scene aboard a 20-yearold truck, which the department has owned for seven
years, on a full tank of gas,
and he said it better return to
the garage after the call just
as it was left.
The firefighters sport a full
set of turnout gear, which
Baker said costs at least
$2,000 for a “good pair.”
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ayy
The men unravel the hose,
of which Baker said he’s had
to replace seven in the past
year, and often a rescue truck
will arrive to the scene
shortly thereafter to transport
any injured residents to a
local hospital — he’s minus
one truck because a $387 bill
to replace its brake line has
put it out of commission.
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Call 891-8298 for info
THE REPORTER
NEWS
TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 29, 2015 | PAGE A5
Volunteers
www.sandmountainreporter.com
Continued from Page A1
Fire Fees
In the past, volunteer fire
departments relied solely
on fundraisers, grants and
tobacco taxes to provide
funding for their departments, but during the General Election in 2014, five
departments allowed their
communities to vote to
have a mandatory $5
monthly fire protection fee
tacked onto their property
taxes.
Of the five, four passed
the fees, which will allow
them to bring in an additional $15,000-$20,000 or
more a year for them to
provide service to their
community.
Retired Georgia Mountain Fireman and member
of the Marshall County Association of Fire Departments and Rescue Squads
Richard Lawson, said the
fees are collected on Oct. 1
“This is just another line
item on your tax bill,”
Lawson said. “The fee is
paid only on a dwelling.
This is where there was a
lot of confusion early on.
But, it’s not something we
just came up with. It’s specific with the law that it has
to be a building constructed as a primary house
for one or more human beings.”
The departments will
collect fees from all of the
non-tax exempt residents
in their district’s area.
Brandon Brown, fire
chief for Georgia Mountain
Fire Department, said fees
are currently being collected for his department at
homes in the department’s
52-mile coverage area.
He said the fees would
allow them the opportunity
to update needed equipment.
“The basic thing they
will be for is replacing
trucks and equipment,”
Brown said. “It will cover
the basic general maintenance on the truck and its
insurance.
“We have three engines
and a rescue truck, and it’s
a constant deal.
“We are lucky we’ve got
some new equipment. We
are better off than most.”
Baker said new turnout
gear is passed on to the
new entries, but he said
some of the men could be
wearing gear anywhere
from three to five years
old.
Currently, for Brian
Walls, volunteer fire chief
for Nixon Chapel, even
purchasing a new truck,
which he was approved for
through a FEMA grant, is
difficult because the department is so strapped for
cash.
Walls, along with three
other departments, face a
unique situation.
Because of some confusion, four fire districts in
Marshall County: Grant,
Pleasant Grove, Nixon
Chapel and Douglas, were
unable to make the ballot
for the 2014 election.
“We’re going to try again
for March 16,” Walls said.
“We’re guesstimating
we’ve got about 300
households or so that
would be paying (the fees).
We’ll have some exempt
for that, of course.”
Walls said on a good
year, his department brings
in roughly $15,000 a year
through donations.
1-8000-COLDA
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T he children and grandchildren of
e Reporter | Bradley Roberts
Fuel costs eat up a huge chunk of any volunteer ire department’s budget. Another
chunk is taken for equipment repairs and replacement, including hoses as shown
below.
“The truck and building
insurance is about $6,500 a
year, and only one of our
trucks has full coverage,”
he said. “It’s sad.”
The fire fees would double the amount of money
taken in by the department,
and would provide similar
help to the other three departments, too.
“If the fire fee was to
pass, it will enable us to
have more up-to-date
equipment and some of the
guys have got turnout gear
that is five and six years
old,” said Douglas Fire
Chief Jimmy Denson.
It could also allow them
to staff more volunteers,
and provide and pay for the
necessary training needed
in Marshall County.
“We have 16 (firemen),
and it’s nowhere near
enough,” Brown said. “It’s
a dying breed.”
All of the men agreed
they could use more volunteers.
Community help
Only nine of the 17
VFDs have opted for the
vote, and if the vote is
passed, initiate the mandatory $5 fee.
For Baker, he said he
didn’t want to force his
community to do something they may not want or
be able to do. He didn’t
want to force them to pay a
fee.
“We don’t want to raise
our people’s taxes out
here,” Baker said. “We did
give them the option to do
a $5 donation on their
water board bill, and that’s
the option to help run the
fire.”
Asbury also hosts multiple golf tournaments and
events to act as fundraisers,
and, for the time being at
least, Baker said things are
working just fine.
“We’re doing better than
we expected,” he said.
“Three days ago, I had a
lady walk into my store
and she donated some
more money.
“You’ll be surprised, you
run a call to another family
member’s house, and then
they’ll come in and give
you a donation.”
But Walls said the funds
haven’t come as easily for
his department in recent
years, and hosting the
fundraisers can be difficult.
After all, this is all done on
a volunteer basis, which
makes future passing of the
fees vitally important.
“With volunteers being
Truman and Pat Stover
request the pleasure of your company
at a reception in honor of their
50th Weddingg Anniversary
Sunday,
October 4, 2015
from
2:30 until 4:30 p.m.
Old Path
Independent
Church
Fellowship Hall
3187 Highway 205
Albertville, AL
so strapped it’s hard to find
time to do fundraising,”
Walls said. “It’s hard
enough on them to train,
keep trucks maintained,
and then you ask them to
do a fill the boot, or cookout or something, and it’s
just taking them away
from their family.”
The security of the income garnered by the fees
would allow the firemen to
rest easier at night knowing if they need to roll out
and respond to a call, they
are in the best possible
shape to extinguish the fire
and save people’s lives and
([SLUHV‡/LPLWSDFNSHUSHUVRQ
livelihood.
Walls said at times it can
be a lot to ask of a few
people, but it’s these few
people who are helping
fund a vital service in the
county.
“You can always count
on some people to make
the donations,” Walls said.
“It’s by their big contributions that they pay for the
coverage some of them
don’t even use.
“If it wasn’t for our big
supporters, we really
wouldn’t be able to make
it.”
No gifts please. Y
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