City council members Joe Mendoza and Felicity Zoberski requested during a city council meeting budget workshop on May 8 that the city include a line item in its final budget to earmark money for public safety.
The request was a follow-up to a request Zoberski made during a previous workshop on April 3 “in the event that fire and EMS in Fernley need assistance keeping up with the growth of the city.” Zoberski didn’t request a specific amount, instead saying the council could decide what amount it might want to earmark.
“Was that not put into this budget, because I can’t see it and it wasn’t discussed this evening,” Mendoza asked at the May 8 meeting.
City Manager Ben Marchant said it was not included in the budget, because he said he was not given any defined parameters or a specific request. Marchant referred to comments by North Lyon County Fire Protection District Chief Brian Bunn that the fire district isn’t getting $1.7 million in property tax revenue that was abated by the states’ taxing formula.
“But it’s the same formula the city has where $4 million of the city’s taxes are abated as well,” Marchant said. “So, we’re all in the same boat and without more specific direction, I was unclear on what we were supposed to budget.”
Mendoza said he wasn’t just referring to the fire district, but also the Lyon County Sheriff’s Office.
“But if the city has the ability and the budget to help provide better public safety for our community, since we are the entity that is creating and allowing the growth that’s coming in a crazy rate, I believe that we should be able to look at those things and at least have a placement holder in the budget so that we could play with and have further discussion,” he said.
Mendoza, who is a captain for North Lyon Fire, said the fire department covers two shifts with six people and one shift with five people.
“There’s a deficiency there,” he said. “We ran over 4,200 calls (last year) and I think we’re pushing 1,400 calls for this last quarter. So, I just think if we are promoting growth in the community and not thinking about public safety, I think we’re doing our community a disservice. So, I would personally like to see a line item in there to have further discussion throughout the year.”
Asked by Marchant what amount he would like to place in that line item, Mendoza said the amount doesn’t matter, as long as the item is created.
“I don’t care if you put $50,000 in there, I just want to be able to have something in there so that we could have further discussions if something were to come up between the sheriff’s office and the fire department,” he said.
Zoberski said they are asking to create a fund that was specifically for public safety, that if the city needed to help with public safety, then it would have a fund for the money to come from.
However, city treasurer Robert Carson said the city can’t allocate money for public safety to a specific fund because it doesn’t have a public safety function.
“We could look at creating a gifts and donations fund, which is restricted by whatever the donation letter is or the council prerogative for a transfer into that fund to save up for,” Carson said.
Mendoza asked what would keep the city from creating a public safety fund.
“What keeps us from creating the fund is that we do not have a public safety function or department in the city of Fernley,” Marchant said.
“You guys are building a fire department, aren’t you?” Mendoza responded.
No, said Marchant.
“Mark IV is not building a fire department for the city of Fernley?” Mendoza asked.
“I understand they are building a fire station building,” Marchant replied.
Mendoza then asked if that is for public safety, to which Marchant said yes.
“Then I think we have a reason to have a public safety fund,” Mendoza said.
Mayor Neal McIntyre said that is not the city of Fernley’s responsibility and that it was in a development agreement that Mark IV build a fire station.
Councilman Ryan Hanan said the city has obligations for its tax money and shouldn’t be giving it to other entities.
“For us to give away taxpayer money that’s earmarked for those things that we are right now neglecting, in some cases, because we don’t have the funds, I think is wildly irresponsible,” he said. “I think in my opinion, the best thing that we can do to help these agencies, including the county and the fire district and the pool board, is to help fast track the applications that are being presented to us for buildings and get those fast tracked so that those agencies start collecting the taxes that they deserve.”
Hanan also said the fire department should be recruiting volunteers to help with its staff shortages. He said Churchill County has about 55 or 60 active volunteers and said he would support helping with incentives to get people to volunteer, and to pay for material or equipment for volunteers.
“If the fire district wants our help, I think it would be incumbent upon the directors who run that department, who also balance their budget and vote on their budget just as we do as a council, those folks should come to us,” Hanan said.
Mendoza said there is no comparison between North Lyon Fire and Churchill County.
“Our people work out of Fernley and live in Fernley, so the response that we could get from volunteers the way Churchill County does is not going to be the same,” he said. “They ran 400 calls last year. We ran 4,200 calls. Just the call volume is so much, you can’t work a full-time job and volunteer 48 hours a week to cover the call volume we have in the city.”
Mendoza argued that public safety includes clean drinking water, proper working sewage plan, and lighting for roads.
“So, to say that this is not an issue for us as a council, I think that’s an ignorant statement, because our primary goal should be public safety for the citizens of Fernley regardless of who’s providing that service or not,” he said.
Hanan said that responsibility falls on the shoulders of the North Lyon County Fire Protection District Board.
“That’s their job and that is the service that you guys are providing,” Hanan said. “It’s not something that this body has any authority to change unless there was some consensus to merge with the city at some point.”
The May 8 workshop was for council members to suggest and discuss changes to the proposed final budget, which will be brought back to the council for final approval on May 21.
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