Town council passes new fire bylaw

By Sharon McLeay Times Contributor

A new fire bylaw, and policy and procedure change, alleviates the burden to provide operational oversight of the Strathmore Fire Department by Strathmore town council, and places their role and responsibility in governance, policy and bylaw setting.
“Instead of trying to amend that beast of a bylaw and put council into a very precarious position of approving operational procedures and being the appeal body for operation procedures, it was decided that we would write a new bylaw,” said Trent West, Town of Strathmore policing and emergency services manager. “Service levels are the responsibility of council to set, which gives me direction.”
The current fire bylaw is 13 years old and does not conform to current requirements. The new bylaw will address weaknesses set out in a 2017 corporate review of bylaws and policies, as well as reflect goals of Strathmore’s 2018 strategic plan.
Residents may wish for a higher level of service, such as those offered by the City of Calgary. However, a paid service comes at a cost that would be passed down to ratepayers. To address reservations on resident expectations, a section is laid out in the bylaw that states it is unreasonable for residents, builders and developers to expect advanced levels of service as they might from a large metropolitan fire service. The policy indicates response may be different for different parts of Strathmore due to geography, staff levels and training, other emergency support, availability of water, adverse weather conditions, and availability of specialized training and equipment
“Over the next decade, service levels will change with the development in the town,” said West.
As well as assisting with call-outs to motor vehicle accidents and helping neighbouring services in mutual aid, the crews also attend to non-urgent community requests for assistance, which some fire departments don’t allow.
Each responder is trained to minimum national fire standards and crews do regular training sessions. Lost persons rescue is also part of the fire crews’ duties. West said they have been called out to locate missing persons and lost children, including some with disabilities, and elderly persons with dementia or cognitive disorders.
The fire chief is appointed and responsible to the Town of Strathmore’s chief administrative officer, and handles the organization, administration and establishment of rules, regulations procedures and guidelines pertaining to operations of the fire department.
Council passed the bylaw through third and final reading and approved the service policy on June 20.