The union representing Town of Normal firefighters found a generally receptive audience at the first of four community town hall-style presentations on their efforts to save a fire station the town plans to close.
Blake Chausse, secretary and political action committee chair for Normal IAFF Local 2442, gave a presentation Thursday to about 80 people at the Activity and Recreation Center [ARC] in Normal.
The audiovisual presentation detailed why firefighters think the town should not close the College Avenue fire station [No. 2], when the town opens a new station on the east side.
Chausse showed a map indicating the area near the soon-to-close station near College and Blair Drive has a higher percentage of vulnerable residents — those younger than 5 or 65 and older.
“The reason for that is the inability to quickly egress [exit] your home in the event of a fire, or a higher incidence rate of those age groups having an emergency medical incident,” Chausse said.
Chausse indicated the Normal Fire Department’s call load has increased 89% since 2006 without adding staff or new fire stations. He cited data from a study the union commissioned that projects a near 10% drop in incident coverage by closing the College Avenue station that he said would disproportionately affect high-risk neighborhoods, including areas with higher frequency of emergency incidents and older housing stock at greater fire risk.
Members of the public who asked questions or gave comments about the fire station proposal all indicated they were opposed to the town’s plans. No one spoke in support of what the town wants to do.
Ralph Dring of Bloomington thinks closing the No. 2 fire station will negatively impact Bloomington’s fire service, too, because of mutual aid agreements.
“Overloading the system in Normal would also be an overload on the City of Bloomington,” Dring said after the meeting.
Andrew Franson, a sophomore at Illinois State University, said he commends how quickly Normal Fire responds to emergencies at Watterson Towers where he lives. He wants more students to become engaged to push Mayor Chris Koos and the town council to reverse their plans.
“It’s appalling to me. I’ve never, ever seen such egregious incompetence by a mayor or a city council,” Franson said.
Town staff has called the union’s contention of increased call volumes leading to increased risk to residents a “false narrative.”
The town maintains the new fire station soon to open at Hershey and Shepard roads will “more evenly distributes our services so all of Normal can be served within the standard response time.”
The standard response time remains a point of contention.
Chausse said the town’s 4-to-6-minute response time standard, which the town cites in the McLean County Area EMA System Police Manual, is intended for rural, volunteer fire departments.
“By 4 to 6 minutes, they don’t think losing Station 2 is important. But by four minutes — and I think we have it on solid ground to say 4 minutes should be the standard — then it does affect that,” Chausse said.
The National Fire Protection Association sets the performance objective to have the first engine arrive on scene in 240 seconds [4 minutes].
The town has insisted the 4–6-minute response range remains a safe and NFPA-approved standard. The town also has said despite increases in call volumes, response times have not suffered and that firefighters remain in-station the bulk of the time on shift. The town maintains its position that technological innovations will continue to support safe response times.
Chausse would like the town to schedule a public work session where the union could detail its report, and he rejects town claims that efforts to save the fire station are an effort to add union jobs and force a renegotiation of the labor contract with the town.
“I would welcome town staff to sit down with us and go through our presentation. I think it will be apparent that that is not the intention. The intention is public safety and worker safety,” Chausse said.
Last week, Koos said, so far, there are not four council members who wish to schedule a work session. The town also said even if there were a problem, keeping the College Avenue station open would not be the first potential solution. He spoke of having roving ambulances stationed near hot spots for calls as just one possible measure if response time averages did change.
The union plans additional forums at 6 p.m. Jan. 29 at the Bloomington Public Library; 4 p.m. Feb. 12 at ISU at a site to be determined; and at 7 p.m. Feb. 26 on Zoom.
