GENTRY — The city council, on Aug. 3, approved a resolution authorizing the mayor to apply for a $25,000 grant to build a new fire substation somewhere in the Cripps Road area, west of Gentry. If funds are received, the $25,000 would be sufficient to build a substation meeting the needs of the fire district to provide improved service to the residents of that area.
The grant application will be submitted to the Arkansas Rural Development Commission for a General Improvement Fund Fire Protection Grant. The grant, if received, will pay for 100 percent of the costs with no matching funds required of the city or the fire department.
According to Vester Cripps, Gentry's fire chief, the substation would lower the insurance rating for the 600 households and 1,500 residents in the area it would serve. The area has a fire suppression ISO rating of 10, the worst possible rating according to Cripps. The city of Gentry is currently rated a Class 5 and other areas outside the city are at Class 6, but the area on the west side of SWEPCO Lake is a Class 10, meaning area residents pay much higher insurance premiums because of the slower response time to reach the area with firefighting equipment.
According to the ISO website (isogov.com), a Class 10 "indicates that the area's fire-suppression program does not meet ISO's minimum criteria" and that "ISO statistics show that those communities have losses at least twice as high as their better-protected neighbors."
"The substation on Taylor Orchard Road meets the (ISO) distance requirements," Cripps said, "but we'd have to build a bridge over SWEPCO Lake for it to count," he added.
According to Cripps, the substation building would hold existing equipment suited for the area, meaning no new fire trucks would be needed. He also said the fire department has four firefighters living within a mile to a mile and a half from the area where the substation would be built, making it possible for them to respond directly to the substation for trucks and equipment instead of driving into Gentry and then returning with equipment.
No specific site for the substation has yet been determined, according to Cripps.
Cripps said it has been a goal of the department to lower the ISO ratings of everyone in the Gentry Fire Department's service area. Much work has been done to bring the city down to a lower ISO rating. The substation would be a major step to do that for the residents living west and north of SWEPCO Lake.
In other business, the council approved three readings of three ordinances. The first named the new street being built between SWEPCO Road and Arkansas Highway 12, at WPA Road, Crowder Avenue after the owner of property who made the road possible. The second increased easement widths from 15 feet to 25 feet for new water and sewer line construction. The third increased required access widths when tract splits are requested for Gentry or its planning jurisdiction.
General News on 08/12/2015