The plan provides a benefit of $20 per month for each year of service, up to a maximum of 25 years. Thus, the maximum award is $500 a month, or $6,000 annually. Participants are eligible to begin receiving benefits on January 1 following the year in which they turn age 60. Active volunteers may continue to earn retirement credits after age 60. Currently, said Rothkopf, 54 individuals —volunteers and their beneficiaries — are receiving monthly benefit checks through LOSAP. In 2012 the district’s total monthly outlay for LOSAP benefits has been $11,260.
Budget appropriations for LOSAP are deposited in an investment fund managed by a Massachusetts firm, Salem Capital Management. “The fund has been doing very well,” with recent annual returns averaging about 6 percent on the fire district’s balance of more than $2.75 million, Rothkopf said.
Other budget components
Elsewhere, the 2013 spending plan proposes to appropriate $95,000 for the principal (up from $70,000 in 2012) and $24,600 for the interest (down from $53,113) on a 20-year bond that represents the district’s only debt, which it incurred for the construction of the Company No. 1 firehouse, the department’s headquarters. With 10 years of payments remaining, the district recently refinanced the bond note in order to take advantage of low interest rates. As a result, said Brunner, Woodstock taxpayers will save about $70,000 over the next decade.
Under the Volunteer Firefighters’ Benefit Law, the district maintains an insurance policy to cover active firefighters who are injured or killed in the line of duty. Such injuries occur regularly in Woodstock, whether from a routine activity like shoveling snow or, in one instance, moving a gurney, which led to a case of cardiac arrest. The budget proposes an appropriation of $90,000 for the insurance, up from $86,500 in the current year.
While the 2013 budget proposes to spend only $33,000 for equipment (a $4,000 decrease from the current year), that budget line may face steep increases in the future, said Brunner. Of particular concern is the possibility that the county will require municipal fire departments to replace their entire inventory of radios. In Woodstock, such a requirement would apply both to handheld devices and the radios installed in the department’s fleet of more than 20 vehicles. The cost would run to millions of dollars. The fire department has established a reserve fund to prepare for the bad news, should it arrive.
The replacement of fire vehicles is also costly, entailing a seven-figure outlay for the biggest trucks. Vehicles are generally replaced according to a schedule formulated by insurance companies, whereby, for example, the approved lifespan of a Class A pumper truck is 25 years, while a tanker must be replaced every 30 years. The district constantly strives to achieve cost efficiency in the management of its vehicles, basing purchasing and maintenance decisions on information obtained from internal studies and other sources. “Are we buying the right equipment? Can we make do with less equipment?” said Brunner by way of explanation.
How busy is Woodstock’s fire department? A previous analysis by Densen discerned a year-to-year trend in which the number of medical emergency-type calls to which Company No. 5, the rescue squad, responded was increasing, while the number of other calls, leading to a response by the department’s other companies, was stable if not decreasing. Densen reportedly completed a recent study of this kind, whose results will be available soon. Through August 1 of this year, said Peters, the department’s five companies had collectively responded to 500 calls.
