Public Safety (Subcommittee of the City Council)

PUBLIC SAFETY COMMITTEE MEETING MINUTES Wednesday April 13, 2011 Laurel Hill Volunteer Fire Department Committee Members Present Alderman William Nash Alderman H Tucker Braddock Jr Committee Members Not Present Alderwoman Jackie Caron Administration and Staff Present Alan H. Bergren, City Manager Ken Scandariato, Fire Chief Chief Tim Jencks, Taftville Vol. Fire Department Emergency Mgmt Dept Director, Roland Frechette Chief Aaron Westervelt, Laurel Hill Fire Dept. Patrick Daley, Norwich Police Lieutenant / East Great Plains Fire Department Volunteer/Central Fire Departments and Others Ron Stoltz, Yantic Fire Department Paul O’Connell, Yantic Fire Department Eng Co 1 Roland Lambert, Occum Fire Department Dan Auger, Taftville Fire Department Frank Blanchard, Yantic Fire Department Darrell Dunnum, Occum Fire Department Michael Lattin, Laurel Hill Fire Department Patrick Fournier, Laurel Hill Fire Department Bill Eyberse, Yantic Fire Department Andrew Daigle, Laurel Hill Fire Department I. Call to Order – Quorum Alderman William Nash called the meeting to order at 7:03 p.m. It was determined a quorum was present. II. Approval of Minutes a. Minutes of February 9, 2011. Alderman H Tucker Braddock motions to approve the minutes of the February 9, 2011 meeting. Alderman William Nash seconds. All in favor the motion is approved. III. Correspondence Alderman Nash asks if there is any correspondence to be presented to the Committee. There is none. IV. Citizen Comment Alderman Nash asks if there are any citizens wishing to speak to the Committee. There are none. V. New Business Alderman Nash asks if there is any new business to be brought before the Committee. Public Safety Meeting April 13, 2011 Page 2 a. Chief Scandariato states that the demolition of Buckingham School is progressing well and that it is now available for use in training and will be for the next little while. He urges the other Department Chief’s to schedule times to utilize the building. Alderman Braddock asks if the neighbors get any sort of warning of training at the schools. Chief Scandariato explains that the trainings are unobtrusive and don’t generally alarm the neighbors. There are no sirens and usually pretty quiet. Chief Scandariato also mentions to the Committee that the Greenville School has been given the power off go-ahead but that he believes that would be dangerous. Alderman Braddock asks if the alarms have battery back-ups. Chief Scandariato states that is why he feels it is too dangerous to turn off the power. There is no back up for the alarm systems which would leave the structure vulnerable. b. City Manager Alan Bergren discusses the Uncas Leap (the falls on Yantic Street) and how dangerous the edge is. There will be discussion with the insurance company and perhaps it can be improved with signage. Installation of fencing would be very costly. Roland Frechette states that it is a dangerous area and when the flooding happened last year when the public went to view the raging falls they were parking very close to the edge and standing very close to the edge. He states that people were refusing to leave when he asked them to so he had the police come out and they were able to take care of it since there are no trespassing signs posted on the property. VI. Old Business a. An update on the status of the Fiber Optic change-over Alderman Nash asks City Manager Bergren if there is an update on the Fiber Optic changeover. City Manager Bergren states that there are some departments already using the new Fiber Optic lines. They are developing a plan and progressing with the changeovers. The main issue is obtaining the new equipment required to connect to the system. Chief Scandariato asks if perhaps they should remove the telephone/copper line item out of his budget so that it doesn’t continue to affect his overall budget. City Manager Bergren states that it would be best to keep the budget as it is for now and perhaps next year they will be ready to move that item to somewhere else. b. Alderman Nash asks about the FEMA reimbursements. Public Safety Meeting April 13, 2011 Page 3 City Manager Bergren states that all the paperwork has been submitted and that they are cautiously optimistic that the reimbursements will be received by the end of the fiscal year. c. Alderman Nash asks how the grant writing process is going. Chief Scandariato states that the process has been stalled due to trouble uploading reports to the state. Reports to the state are required to be up to date to be eligible for grant funding. A main contributing factor is the copper lines and the non- centralized reporting from the various departments. This problem will be greatly reduced when the change over to fiber optics takes place. Pat Daley explains the process of reporting within the department, the verification process that is completed by a code clerk at central reporting, and the process that must take place to make any necessary corrections. With the fiber optics the reports will be transmitted rather than downloaded on disc and mailed back and forth until the final report is ready to be transmitted. Alderman H Tucker Braddock asks City Manager Bergren if all the departments are going to be connected to the fiber optic cable. City Manager Bergren states that yes, all departments are going to be connected. Alderman H Tucker Braddock informs the committee and all present that it would be beneficial to go the Mayors meetings to discuss these issues. Anything can be discussed, it is an open forum. Alderman William Nash explains to everyone that he is working very hard to attain all the goals for the departments to get them to their peak efficiency and to have all their needs to be able to be most effective. He is also working very hard to get the fiber optic connections completed. d. Chief Scandariato discusses the water supply issues affecting all of Norwich. He is working with NPU and Public Works. NPU has identified the needs and is working with public works and making sure to put piping down before paving. It all comes down to finding difficulties. The work completed thus far has greatly improved the water flow to several areas already. Alderman William Nash asks if the water lines can be piggybacked with gas piping? Can the installations be combined? Chief Scandariato states that they have already been doing this. The problems have been identified and a plan has been mapped out and documented. He also states that the hydrant banding has assisted with this as well. Alderman H Tucker Braddock asks if all the hydrants are marked. For instance there is no city water to Scotland Road. Public Safety Meeting April 13, 2011 Page 4  Chief Blanchard explains that they were able to coordinate with gas piping at the intersection of Scotland Road and Huntington Lane and they were able to increase flow from less than 400 gallons per minute to a 2000 gallons per minute hydrant. That increases how far up Scotland Road they can push water. Chief Scandariato says he has the cost/benefit information for the water piping needs. He hopes the Council understands that the requests are not made lightly. They just want to be effective in keeping the public safe. Alderman William Nash understands that funding is a major issue. He thanks everyone for all their assistance and patience. He wishes the city could afford to do everything the departments need done. He feels helpless to do anything. e. Chief Blanchard discusses a supplemental secondary informational system called eDispatches that transmits the fire call tones over cell phones. It requires no extra work and fills in the gaps and dead zones for the call pagers. There is a delay on the transmission but that is better than not at all when not within the pager range. The cost to utilize this supplement is less than the cost of one pager and works excellent. There has been a free trial that the departments have participated in and it functions wonderfully. It doesn’t replace the existing pagers. It does however transmit the tones (after a short delay) to the cell phones. Pat Daley loves the system. He was skeptical but after a short time using the system it has absolutely worked wonderfully. Alderman H Tucker Braddock asks if they can reply back to it. Chief Blanchard states that there is a system that lets them reply back to let the house know who, if anyone, is responding but the cost is about three times that of the supplemental pager system. It’s not really necessary. f. Bill Eyberse discusses a new recruitment tool developed with NFA. There is a syllabus for “Intro to Fire Service” that will be offered. They are hoping to entice new recruits. Alderman H Tucker Braddock discusses the Project Learn. It is about teaching life lessons so the students will be ready for the real world. g. Alderman H Tucker Braddock asks Chief Blanchard if there is any information on the gates. Pat Daley does not have any new information at this time. VII. Adjournment Alderman Braddock motions to adjourn at 7:52 p.m. Alderman Nash seconds. Meeting adjourned. Respectfully Submitted By Christine E Averna