Departments face changes

By Jennifer Smith - Vernon Morning Star Published: August 19, 2008

A fire department’s opposition to council’s orders is supposed to remain private in Coldstream. Therefore to ensure resistance stays silent, Coldstream council has efforts underway to adjust the operations of its two departments. “As a senior staff member, you’re expected to take direction from council, whether you like it or not...not to publicly go out with your opposition,” said Wendy Kay, chief administrative officer. The efforts, which are to provide clearer direction for the departments, are aimed to bring both fire halls on the same page. The Coldstream and Lavington Fire Departments are actually one department with two fire halls. They have similarities in operations, but also operate separately in some aspects. “We’re looking at matching the two of them up because there’s some discrepancies,” said Mayor Gary Corner.

The changes to come into effect won’t impact the departments’ actual constitutions, said Kay, but are based on two documents which council and the departments are to abide by. They are: the memorandum of understanding and communication protocol. The documents have been in effect since 2006, at which time the two departments’ constitutions were also made similar. “It’s been official for the past two years, but there’s been some resistance,” said Kay. An example of how the departments have been operating since 2006 includes calls for service. When there’s a structure fire at the Coldstream end, Lavington is supposed to respond to the border (in the Coldstream Ranch area) until further direction is received – either their assistance is needed or they can stand down. The situation works the same for Coldstream when there is a structure fire at the Lavington end. They’re to work together, where it makes sense to do so as one,” said Kay. “Prior to 2006 both fire halls had different constitutions. They did training on their own, did their own budgets. “For years they’ve acted independently.” Now training and budgets are done in unison, said Kay. Another example Kay provides of the fire halls working in unison includes council’s recent wishes for one common fire hall logo.