Alexandria Postpones Action on Accepting Extrication Equipment from Smithville Fire Department

The Smithville Volunteer Fire Department has offered to loan its oldest set of extrication tools to the Alexandria Fire Department to start its own extrication team. But the Alexandria Mayor and Aldermen have not yet decided to accept it.
During the regular monthly meeting Tuesday night, the Alexandria Aldermen voted to postpone action until the city learns more from its insurance provider about the potential liability. “I’d like to make a motion that we table this until we can have a workshop and find out from the insurance company what we need to do and what is covered and what is not covered,” said Alderman John Suggs. The motion was approved unanimously. Alexandria Fire Chief Brian Partridge, DeKalb County Fire Chief Donny Green, and a representative from the City of Smithville will be invited to participate in the workshop.
At the February meeting of the Smithville Mayor and Aldermen, the council granted Smithville Fire Chief Charlie Parker’s request to loan the extrication equipment to Alexandria.
“I would like to ask the board if it’s possible for us to loan the oldest set of tools to the Alexandria Fire Department. They are in the process of trying to start a rescue/extrication team down there. They have a crew and already have several members certified in using the tools. Some of them even came up and trained with us too. We would like to help them out and let them have our oldest set. It’s still useable. We were using it up until we just replaced it. We’d like to see if we could loan that to them to help them get started until they can buy or get something on a grant. It would be understood that the tools would be their responsibility with no liability coming back to us on that. I have talked with the Alexandria Fire Chief and we’ll make sure they are going to accept the responsibilities of it,” said Chief Parker.
Vester Parsley, who serves as city attorney for both the Cities of Smithville and Alexandria, has prepared an agreement should Alexandria decide to accept the equipment. “Originally I was asked to do this agreement between the town and the City of Smithville and I’ll wait to see what comes out of your workshop. They (City of Smithville) just wants something to relieve them of the cost of any maintenance and any liability because this is sort of on a permanent loan. It’s not an outright gift but it’s more or less going to be a permanent loan to the city for their use. It’s one thing for the City of Smithville to loan it to you but its another thing for you to accept it. You don’t have to accept it. But it would be accepted under conditions,” said City Attorney Parsley at the Alexandria meeting Tuesday night.