When 'free money' isn't cheap

Wilson City Council has approved applying for federal grants that will provide funds to construct a sixth city fire station and to pay some operational costs temporarily. But the deal would leave the city with around $1.5 million in new operational costs, once the federal grant expires, and require a half-million-dollar investment in fire vehicles.

This is not "free money," by a long shot, but only one council member — Bill Blackman — voted against the costly gift.

Fire Chief Don Oliver had sold the grant proposals to City Council by saying the city had not built a new fire station since 1975 and then comparing emergency call volumes from 1975 and today. That approach is misleading, at best, but it did get the newspaper's endorsement. The city has built at least four new fire stations since 1975; it has simply not added any stations since then. Belated kudos to the Wilson Times for (finally) pointing out the disingenuousness in Oliver's argument in today's article, which cites some of the new stations that have been built since 1975. Wilson relocated its headquarters station on Douglas Street to a new facility on Hines Street in the early 1980s. In 1987, it replaced the Fairview Avenue station with a new one on Forest Hills Road. And in 1996, under Oliver's watch, the department relocated two stations, one to U.S. 301 and the other to Airport Boulevard. By my count, that's four new stations since 1975, leaving only one station older than 30 years.

If you look at the two most recent stations, you'll be struck by how much larger and more elaborate those are compared to the stations built before Oliver arrived. The fire department is probably better since Oliver came here from Colorado; it certainly is more lavishly equipped. Years ago, Oliver talked the city into buying a truck with a ladder that would reach to the top of the seven-story BB&T building, even though the BB&T tower is equipped for fighting fires from inside the building. (Do you think New York's fire department had ladders that would reach to the top of the World Trade Center?). The truck cost around $750,000. To my knowledge, that ladder has not been required for fighting any fire since then, but it has starred in some fire department demonstrations. The next time a fire call goes out, count the number of vehicles that respond. I've rarely seen fewer than four, even for an inconsequential electrical fire. The department has used Homeland Security grants to buy golf-cart size vehicles for ferrying people and equipment. It has taken on fire safety education for children, equipping a house on wheels for its teaching mission. Its latest (and largely unnoticed) work is converting a house adjacent to the Hines Street station as a new fire safety education facility, presumably replacing that elaborate school on wheels. This conversion has been expensive, but I've not seen any figures.

I don't doubt that Wilson has a good fire department. I can't remember the last time we had a death from fire. But City Council ought to be a little more skeptical in discerning "needs" and "wants," and taxpayers ought to be wary of "free grants" that will end up costing them $1.5 million a year or more.