Bozeman residents will see two first responder issues on their ballots this year. The first is a bond to fund the construction of Fire Station 4, on the growing West side of town.
Battalion Chief James Short says Bozeman firefighter response time is averaging about 10 minutes, which is 4 minutes longer than the national standard.
“Building a Fire Station 4 in that area serves all of the city of Bozeman because it keeps units in their districts to respond to calls they're within their response times and their response zones,” Short said.
For a median single-family home the bond would cost about $4 a year for 20 years.
The second question is a first responder levy, which would hire 30 police officers, 22 firefighters and 11 support staff over the next five years.
The additional hires would staff the potential new Fire Station 4 and a ‘Quick Response Unit’ that would use a smaller vehicle to more easily respond to incidents not in need of a fire engine.
Chief of Police Jim Veltkamp says additional police officers would go toward a dedicated traffic unit.
“If you see somebody running red light at 19th and Main, and there's a patrol car sitting there you may wonder why didn't that patrol car stop that car the reason is in their beat there may be one two three or four calls pending that they need to get to and they simply don't have the capacity to stop that car,” Veltkamp said.
A recent federal grant will help lower the asking amount by covering 12 firefighting positions for three years. With that the median single-family homeowner would pay around $30 a month.
City Mayor Terry Cunningham says he is often asked why taxes from the new construction around Bozeman are not covering the growing needs .
“We are continually facing a situation where our personnel costs going up, our materials costs are going up,” Cunningham said.
Cunningham says the cost of operating city functions is rising faster than the newly taxable properties. If the measures do not pass, the city commission will consider budget cuts across the board and expect slower response times from first responders.
