Jefferson City Council 3_13The Jefferson Fire Department is getting help from the City to purchase a new piece of equipment.

The City Council approved at last week’s meeting to buy an Ultra High Pressure Fire Truck for an amount not to exceed $135,000. City Administrator Mike Palmer says the City hasn’t out right paid for a new fire truck before. Historically, the Council put money toward purchasing a new truck knowing that other funds were coming from the townships. However, the township money is slated for a new truck in the next fews years.

“So what the City did is actually, they’re going to purchase this out of excess general fund money. They’ve left the door open for if the City ever issues another bond that the money can come out of the bond to pay back the general fund. In essence we’re not spending down our reserves. We try to keep our reserves about 30-percent of our overall expenses, which we feel is a comfortable number and a responsible number.”

Fire Chief Jack Williams says some of the benefits of the new truck include: having all rescue equipment on one truck, using one-fifth of the water for structure fires, quicker response time, as well as using less personnel to use the equipment to put out a fire. It is a Chevrolet 3500 pickup truck that weighs 20,000-pounds less than a regular truck. It also costs a third of the price of a regular fire truck. He talks about the kind of truck that the department will trade-in to help offset some of the cost of the new truck.

“It’s a 1998 truck that we purchased used from Texas, so it doesn’t have all of the winterizing abilities that we need here in Iowa. So we have to empty that truck of all water in the winter months, which makes it pretty much pointless, it’s just an equipment hauler.”

Williams is happy with the purchase and adds it’s nice to see the City stepping up to support the fire department.