More regional services on table for Bay de Grave towns

By Olivia Bradbury, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

A fire captain has been reaching out to the member towns of the Bay de Grave Regional Fire Services Board with a proposal to extend services beyond firefighting.
The board includes Clarke’s Beach, Cupids, Makinsons, Roaches Line, North River, and South River.
Jeramy Pollett, a captain with the Bay de Grave Regional Fire Department, sent out letters to members of the board proposing they add regionalized snow-clearing, garbage collection, and maintenance services to the board’s responsibilities.
South River Mayor Bev Wells and councillor Eric Snow were among the recipients of Pollett’s letter. Council discussed the proposal at its March 4 public meeting.
Councillor David Petten said the Town would need to know what the plan is for the various services before making a decision.
“If you’ve only got one group (providing the services), who gets service first?” he asked. “How does that work?”
Snow and Wells agreed there are still a lot of questions that needed to be answered.
Council members discussed the various services being proposed, and while they agreed garbage collection and maintenance such as mowing could be doable as each of the towns could be serviced on different days, they felt snow-clearing would not be feasible as every town would need that service simultaneously.
Deputy Mayor Melissa Hierlihy said council would also need to know the financial cost of the regional services and ensure that South River is not paying more than its fair share.
“If the board is going to do it, I want a set price,” she said. “It should be done with no net profit.”
Snow doubted the Bay de Grave Regional Fire Department could make a decision about regionalized services itself. Rather, it would need to come from a committee of all the towns in the area. “I think that would be a Town decision, not a Bay de Grave decision, personally,” he said.
Hierlihy suggested the fire department is proposing a regional approach for other services due to the success it has had in providing the fire protection service, and getting a better rate.
“You save money in bulk, so if you’ve got more people, and you’re looking to contract, the bigger the contract is, the less typically you’re going to pay per house,” she said. “So the concept is not a bad thing, it’s just making sure it’s done the right way.”
Petten wondered if someone would be assigned to coordinating the various municipalities’ equipment and crews, or whether there would be a contractor or centralized municipal depot that would provide the equipment and hire workers.
Hierlihy allowed Pollett and those proposing regionalized services have not gotten that far in their plans yet. “Right now, I think this is just one big idea,” she said.
“They have to come up with a strong model of what they’re planning to do before we can even determine if it’s feasible or not,” said Petten.
Snow agreed, suggesting council is a long way away from making a decision about it.
“But, it’s a start,” Snow admitted.