The county’s fire chief says the pros are better equipped to serve the growing community, but defenders rally behind the volunteers in Nokomis.
Ramon Lopez
Original Air Date: Jan. 15, 2024
Host: The Sarasota County Fire Department wants to expand its coverage area. But its proposal to cut back the county’s last volunteer fire department increasingly looks too hot to handle. Ramon Lopez reports.
Ramon Lopez: A controversial Sarasota County Fire Department proposal to reduce the responsibility of the Nokomis Volunteer Fire Department drew lots of residents with questions and concerns this past Saturday morning at an open house at Fire Station 23 in Nokomis. County fire officials say the move will improve service, but others believe it will lead to elimination of the volunteer fire department that’s served the community for more than 75 years. The Sarasota County Commissioners will hold a public hearing on the matter on Jan. 21st.
We hear from Ian Emmons, the county’s deputy fire chief for operations.
Ian Emmons: This was a question-and-answer. We’ve had a couple public education events where a presentation was delivered that identified the issues at hand and the potential outcomes. This was more so gauged towards providing, as we’re edging nearer to Jan. 21st, where the Board of County Commissioners are going to make a decision of some sort—this was an opportunity for the individuals who may not have been able to get out to those presentations or had lingering questions to come and ask those questions and receive answers.
Nokomis Volunteer Fire Department locker room. Photo: Lopez
RL: Sarasota County Fire Department Chief David Rathbun says the changeover would enhance service and provide equity that’s absent today. Homeowners in the Nokomis area subsidize operation of the NVFD through $100 annual donations but don’t pay for coverage the county provides under the mutual aid agreement. If this goes through, those homeowners would pay for county fire service with an estimated $250 increase in their property taxes. Rathbun believes the county plan will better accommodate growth. NVFD Chief Steve Kona says the switchover would take place in Oct. 2025. His firefighting area would shrink from 16 square miles to five or six. He would lose access to a county fire station and needed donations. Kona believes his fire department would have to shut down operations within a year. Willie Walter is concerned about the county’s scheme.
Willie Walter: When you have an institution like the Nokomis Volunteer Fire Department, which we contribute to regularly, you don’t want to change from that quickly. You need to have a very deliberate plan, and people need to understand what it is. I’m ambivalent to whether it comes or goes. I need the services of emergency responders, and I appreciate anybody that’s willing to sign up and do that. As retired Coast Guard, anybody that’s willing to help save somebody’s life or property—we want them all around, but I understand things are changing. The county’s changing. The amount of growth we have here changes the rules. My dad was a volunteer fire department person in southern Minnesota way back when I was a kid, but that was a farming community—a very small town. This is vastly different. We have a lot more medical issues going on. But if we can sustain both, that would be lovely.
RL: Newly-elected Sarasota County Commissioner Tom Knight, who served as Sarasota County Sheriff before retiring, also attended the event and had a lot to say about the issue.
Tom Knight: We need to make sure that the decisions we make are sound, not just emotional. I’m trying to make the best decision with emotion involved but also for the future of the public safety of this area. The perception and the message from the county fire department is equity and financials. For me, it’s a big budget. They receive their money through impact fees and their districts that they have, and I understand it, but at this point in time, with property taxes continually going up, with inflation, with insurance—and now we’re going to see insurance going up again, not just because of wind storms but because of what’s going on in California—it’s just been a lot of little things in the past five years that have really hit people in the pocketbook. To even talk about the increase of funding that’s necessary doesn’t go well with the public right now, and I don’t think financial concerns are a good cause to make a change.
Open house at the Nokomis fire station. Photo: Lopez
I was hoping that two leadership groups of two different organizations would be able to compromise, and we wouldn’t be here as elected officials trying to make a thing. I see this as a leadership issue. I was in leadership for 34 years as a cop up until the point in time that I retired as the sheriff, and not everything was perfect, but at the end of the day, when you have two organizations providing similar services in public safety, the back-and-forth amongst the leadership has left it so that elected officials have to make the decision, and that bothers me.
Cutting any type of resources, I will never do. How do we work this out strategically without raising people’s taxes? The biggest thing with this is that the people in Nokomis feel that their tax rates are going to go up about something they don’t need. Removing any type of resources would be a no from me.
My end decision is not made yet. My end decision will be not on money; it’ll be on public safety. “Have we had anything that’s happened that’s created a public safety issue?” Things of that nature. I’m sure there’s going to be a lot of other things coming to the board that day that I haven’t heard, so I can’t say for certain how I’m going to vote, nor could I say publicly how I’m going to vote, because I don’t know for certain yet. But certainly, public safety is the most important thing, not money.
RL: This is Ramon Lopez for WSLR News.
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