Taylor City Councilman Charley Johnson (fifth from left), asked at the Sept. 30 city council study session how prepared the city fire department is to respond to emergencies on streets where water main breaks are problematic, as other city officials listen.
By SUE SUCHYTA
Sunday Times Newspapers
TAYLOR – Councilman Charley Johnson asked Deputy Fire Chief Stanley Pachron at the Sept. 30 study session how prepared the department is to respond to fires on streets with water main breaks.
Johnson asked Pachron to explain how many gallons of water the city’s fire trucks hold.
Pachron said the Fire Department has two trucks which carry 750 gallons, and a truck which carries 8,000 gallons. He said they can pump 1,750 gallons of water per minute, so the smaller capacity trucks could pump out its water supply in 30 seconds.
Johnson asked what the department’s response would be on a street with frequent water main breaks.
Pachron did not respond directly to the question, but did state that currently, one of the department’s fire trucks is out of service.
Pachron also explained a request to modify the fee schedule for lift assists for reccurring calls, which subsequently was approved at the Oct. 1 council meeting.
“What we are seeing recently is more people with obesity, and we have multiple cases in our city for people over 750 pounds, and we have one close to 1000 pounds,” Pachron said. “What we are proposing here, is because we keep getting calls to help get them into bed multiple times a day, or a wheelchair, it just costs us too much money to run out there.”
He said billing would be initiated through AccuMed after the second or third call.
(Sue Suchyta can be reached at [email protected])