Montana VFD gets Split Decision from District Court
A Montana volunteer fire department has lost its bid to deliver first responder emergency medical services, but has been able to keep its doors open.
Earlier this year, the Cabinet View Volunteer Fire Department was closed down by Lincoln County allegedly for failing to meet state requirements. At the time the department was seeking to expand its services and provide first responder EMS. The company filed suit against Lincoln County, Lincoln County Sheriff’s Department, and Troy dispatch seeking to override the objections of the county to the department responding on EMS runs and clarify its right to respond to fires.
On Wednesday, a district court judge ruled that the company had the right to respond to structure fires and wildland fires, but not medical incidents without county approval. In essence the court concluded that the department cannot expand services without county approval.
According to news reports, the department has another option to provide the services it wants to offer: obtain 226 signatures from area residents. That may not seem like a big deal except the area CVVFD serves only has 60 residents.
Although some of the above information is incorrect this is a very sad story of politics and greed. I was with CVFSA and sat in many meetings where we asked if we could work with the local ambulance service and fire department, every time we were told “no”. The reason? They were afraid we would take away some of their call revenue, (the ambulance) as they had that experience when another fire dept. 40 miles to the south of them started up an ambulance service and took “away” some of their calls. Since we are inbetween those two they will not budge for fear of taking away calls, stating it happened once it will not happen again. We only wanted the chance to respond to mva’s in our area (the Fire Dept in town was responding to MVA’s in the CVFSA!)and also provide First Response on incidents, NOT have an ambulance service. CVFD had everything needed to get licensed to provide First Response other than the Ambulance Service refusing to sign the (transport?) agreement with CVFD. Cabinet View Fire Service Area was officially dissolved Aug. 13th despite CVFSA turning in 236 signatures, (out of approx 250 residences)but beings the Commissioners are buddies with the Ambulance and Fire Dept in town, CVFSA never had a chance. We have numerous lies and illegal actions on record that the Commissioners committed. For example, CVFSA submitted a petition from homeowners asking to be annexed into the CVFSA, they rejected it, saying it’s a waste of time, yet a very short time later when presented with a petition to dissolve CVFSA they were very hasty in starting the process even though that petition was started by someone who did not even own property in the CVFSA. They are telling us (CVFSA property owners) that we are covered by their ISO rating and our insurance won’t go up in spite of their Fire Dept being more than five miles away. Can anyone offer advice or help?