Laserfiche WebLink
Regular City Council Meeting <br /> Monday, March 25, 2019 <br /> Page 11 <br /> to have out there. Just in terms of talking about a suburban Ramsey County re- <br /> gional model, one of the things he thought that had been discovered in Roseville's <br /> transition over the years is that the fire fighting service is certainly one that has a <br /> lot of tradition and history so there can be that institutional resistance to change <br /> just because it has been done for years a certain way and he understood that. He <br /> agreed that this transition will take some time because every community has dif- <br /> ferent needs in regard to the number of calls a year. <br /> Councilmember Etten agreed with the thoughts on some sort of a regional model <br /> and appreciated the Fire Department looking for ways to share the purchase of <br /> equipment with the other cities. <br /> Councilmember Etten asked how many times a year does the Fire Department ask <br /> for and receive auto aid and mutual aid. <br /> Chief O'Neill stated it is about twelve times a year as every time there is a struc- <br /> ture fire, the City gets auto aid. He explained there is no way with Roseville's <br /> staffing level that the Fire Department can adequately staff a fire with the posi- <br /> tions needed by themselves. Even with the eight employees, the Fire Department <br /> would not be able to do it but will get a little closer. <br /> Councilmember Laliberte stated she thought the City and Fire Department needed <br /> to talk about the eight employees unless someone wants to have discussion about <br /> changing what the City provides for services because eight full-time employees <br /> are based on what the Roseville Fire Department does. <br /> Councilmember Etten stated he did not want to change services and thought there <br /> were important pieces to this. The question that consistently sits for him is if <br /> there is a role for a paid on-call attachment to this for those times when the Fire <br /> Department needs help. He would like to have information on why Roseville <br /> cannot have all part-time staff when some of the other neighboring cities can do <br /> that. <br /> Chief O'Neill stated it does not mean that the Fire Department cannot work with <br /> all part-time staff but what he has structured for the Council is the most budget ef- <br /> ficient model which is the full-time model due to the turn-over. He stated turn- <br /> over is the biggest cost associated with part-time staff and is the reason why the <br /> Fire Department has strayed away from that completely. When hiring a full-time <br /> fire fighter, that individual comes to them fully trained and can basically be on the <br /> street the next day. The part-time staff comes to the Fire Department with no <br /> training in fire or EMS and takes approximately 2.5 years of training to get the in- <br /> dividual up to that. During all of that time, the City is paying for the training, <br /> which is extremely expensive and for the worker's hours during that time. What <br /> he has found from 2005 to 2013, when the change over was started, was that on <br /> average, the part-time people were leaving at 3.3 years, which is basically giving <br />