Part 1 of 2: City, county fire departments see need for new trucks, more firefighters

As 2019 comes to a close and 2020 rolls in, fire department chiefs at Butler County and Poplar Bluff are hopeful new trucks and staff are in their future.

In this two-part series, each chief talks about the last year while looking ahead to the next.

Information from Poplar Bluff Fire Department — including a 30% increase in structure fires — will appear Saturday in the Daily American Republic.

Butler County Fire Department has seen a successful rotation of older equipment to its sub-stations, but continues to struggle with falling volunteer numbers to staff those areas.

New trucks by spring

Butler County’s fire department is getting two new trucks in the coming months, said chief Bob Fredwell as he looked ahead to the coming year.

“We ordered a new pumper truck back in April,” Fredwell said, “and we should have it around March or April.”

The new truck, with a 1,250-gallon-per-minute pump and 1,000-gallon water tank will replace a 2014 model, Fredwell said.

“Typically, we like to replace our first-out pumper every five years. Then, we’ll rotate the older trucks to our sub-stations,” Fredwell noted.

“We also ordered a new rescue truck,” he said.

That truck, also expected to arrive in the spring, will replace a single-cab model and will have four doors.

“We’ll put a bigger box on it to carry more tools,” Fredwell said.

Once on site, Fredwell said, both trucks should be able to be put into service quickly.

“There won’t be a whole lot of training on the new pumper necessary because it’s going to be pretty much the same as the older one,” he said.

Currently, Fredwell noted, his department enjoys a fleet of good, serviceable trucks.

“We’ve got pretty good equipment now, I’ve got to say. All of our trucks are diesel automatics, and the maintenance is so much lower than when we had gas engines,” Fredwell said.

Looking back on 2019, Fredwell said, his department saw a decline in its number of fire calls.

“We had 318 calls this year, where last year we had 395,” he said.

An average year, Fredwell noted, can see anywhere from 350 to 450 calls.

The last 12 months, he said, saw 54 structure fires, down slightly from last year’s 63, and because of the wet spring and summer, the number of grass and woods fires also declined.

“We only had 120 grass and woods fires, so we didn’t have a busy season at all. There’s been years where we’ve had 120 calls in a month,” he said.

Volunteer force shrinks

While the department’s fleet of trucks is being kept up to date and the number of fire calls declined, Fredwell said, he still has to contend with a smaller volunteer force than in years past.

Currently, on weekdays, he said, he has five full-time firefighters working, relying on volunteers to take up the slack.

“One of my biggest concerns is our number of volunteers,” he said. “When I took over here in 1988, we had upwards of 200 volunteers. Now, our active roster is probably around 85 or 90.”

Some of his 14 sub-stations, Fredwell noted, don’t get a lot of calls, and he believes volunteers sometimes lose interest, making it hard to keep them ready to respond.

“I’d like to see eight to 10 volunteers at each station ... that’s a good number. That would ensure at any time we would have two or three available,” he said.

Many other departments faced with similar volunteer shortages, Fredwell said, have resorted to “trying to raise taxes to hire more full-time staff, but we don’t even want to consider trying to raise taxes here. That’s why the volunteers are so important.

“We’re definitely always trying to add younger guys.”

Anyone age 21 or older who may want to volunteer, Fredwell said, is encouraged to contact him at 573-785-6049.