Rich Civic Times
GARDEN CITY, Utah. June 20, 2013, Garden City Fire Board Meeting. Currently there are no fire
restrictions. However, because it has
been really hot with lots of wind, the local fire district feels some action
needs to be taken. They also think that
everyone should be in agreement on what fire restrictions should be put in
place. Last year, individuals staying at
the state parks could build fires while everywhere else, fires were banned. It caused a lot of confusion and
misunderstandings.
Chief Kurek said he had
contacted the state officials, the County Commissioners, and invited any of the
local fire board members to come to a meeting where they can work out any
issues and come up with a plan for the summer.
If all of the agencies involved will work together, inconsistencies
shouldn’t be a problem this year.
It was suggested that all of
the volunteer fire fighters be given the EMT training through at least the
first level. The disaster exercises that
were held this past month with the National Guard, helicopters, and so forth
were very beneficial. However, it became
evident that everyone needed to have a better understanding of medical issues.
Starting this next year, the
state will use new audit procedures. In
addition to the financial audit, an audit of policies, procedures, and
resolutions will also be carried out.
Approval of all major
purchases or expenses will be verified. Tiffany Wahlberg, CPA, requested Chief
Kurek write the month on any large purchases or expenditure so that it will be
easy to go back to the minutes of that month to make sure the item had board
approval prior to the transaction.
When bids are let for
projects, there should be up to three, depending on the money amount
involved. This is to make sure that one
contractor is not always hired, and that everyone has an equal chance of
obtaining the job depending on their bid.
There are restrictions on
certain fund balances. When they go over
that amount, it doesn’t mean that the money needs to be spent. Those funds can be transferred through motion
by the board to a capital expenditure account.
Since the fire department
here is small there may be more than one family member involved. In these cases, care should be taken to make
sure that one family member is not supervising another family member. Currently Mike Wahlberg should supervise TomWahlberg. However, since they are brothers, Chief Kurek
supervises both of these individuals. As
long as it is mentioned in the minutes and that procedure followed, this show
there is no nepotism in this situation.
The records officer must have
his training completed before December of this year. There is a class available on the
computer. Also, all board members must
also have taken their training. These
courses can be found at sao.utah.gov.
The auditors will check training carefully.
The budget needs to be
adjusted to account for any grants or unusual activities that have taken
place. This can be done by motion of the
Board. Also adjustments where areas are
over or under budget can also be handled by motion of the Board. It can be done any time during the year. A board member requested that some of the
work be done at the next meeting.
Because the public may want to attend that meeting, the agenda must be
posted seven days prior to the meeting and those items be listed as part of the
agenda.
Insurance expenses and
retirement fund changes need to be made.
Currently training costs are quite high and may need to be adjusted.
It was suggested that the
board members read through the policies and procedures as well as the
resolutions to make sure that everything is being followed that are in that
manual. As an example, one policy states
that an individual will be dropped from the board if they miss more than five
meetings in a year. The current number
of absences by board members was discussed making each individual aware of their
attendance this year, (two have missed four meetings this year so far).
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