Shepherd City Council members allegedly berate firefighters
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By Alex Wukman in The Eastex Advocate
Members of the Shepherd Volunteer Fire Department (SVFD) and members of the Shepherd City Council are still not able to see eye-to-eye. According to a statement from Shepherd Mayor Pat Lunsford, City Councilman Derlin Barnhill allegedly verbally assaulted members of the SVFD on Tuesday January 26.
Lunsford stated that the fire department members were testing to make sure the city’s fire hydrants were in working order in anticipation of an upcoming Insurance Services Office (ISO) evaluation.
An unofficial statement that has been circulating since the alleged altercation occurred indicates that Barnhill allegedly called the members of the VFD “worthless volunteers” and stated that the medals on their uniforms are “crap.”
A concerned citizen also stated that Barnhill told the firefighters that they “had to get the city’s permission before opening the fire hydrants.”
The SVFD declined to issue a formal statement, instead saying “There is no comment at this time due to fear of retaliation from members of city council. However, a statement regarding the hydrant incident will be made public very shortly.”
According to their website ISO collects information that insurance companies use to determine their underwriting policies. “That information includes evaluations of public fire protection, flood risk, and the adoption and enforcement of building codes in individual communities,” states ISO’s website.
They go on to state that “information on municipal services helps the communities with their efforts to manage and mitigate their risk.”
ISO’s program of rating municipal and volunteer fire departments is called the Public Protection Classification (PPC) program. In it representatives from ISO go to communities all across the country to evaluate municipal fire-protection efforts.
“A community’s investment in fire mitigation is a proven and reliable predictor of future fire losses,” states the ISO website.
Because how much money a community is willing to invest in fire protection impacts the risk of a house catching on fire, insurance companies use PPC information to help establish premiums for both fire and homeowner’s insurance.
The ISO website goes on to state that insurance companies generally offer “lower premiums in communities with better [fire] protection” and that “many communities use the PPC as a benchmark for measuring the effectiveness of their fire-protection services.”
In fire prevention circles PPC number is simply referred to as “the ISO rating.” It is a number assigned by the company and is on a one to ten scale.
“Class 1 generally represents superior property fire protection, and Class 10 indicates that the area’s fire-suppression program does not meet ISO’s minimum criteria,” states the ISO website. The evaluation is concerned with three major areas of fire response: fire alarm and communication systems, fire department and the municipal water supply.
The fire alarm and communication system accounts for 10 percent of the total classification and, according to the ISO website, focuses on “the community’s facilities and support for handling and dispatching fire alarms.”
Fully 50 percent of the review is focused on the fire department. ISO evaluators consider everything from equipment carried on a fire truck to the truck’s pumping capacity to who the fire department personnel are and how much training they have before they grade the department.
The review of the city’s water system makes up 40 percent of the evaluation.
“ISO reviews the water supply a community uses to determine the adequacy for fire-suppression purposes. We also consider hydrant size, type, and installation, as well as the inspection frequency and condition of fire hydrants,” states the ISO website.
While the SVFD was not able to comment on the alleged incident with Barnhill, they were able to provide the most recent ISO rating. The ISO evaluation is an annual event and SVFD’s 2009 rating was 6/9/10.
According to a written statement from SVFD, the rating is six “if you live within 1,000 feet of a fire hydrant and within five miles of the department.”
The rating is nine “if you live outside of the 1,000 feet of a fire hydrant and between five and 10 miles of the department” and for homeowners who live more than 10 miles from the department the rating is 10.
Lunsford also stated that in the immediate aftermath of Barnhill’s confrontation with the VFD members there was speculation that many, if not all, of the members of the department would resign. The SVFD stated that “no one has resigned at this time.”
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this is a bunch of crap. The state of Texas does the ISO testing not the local little fire departments and also the fire trucks are supposed to be pump tested which most of them are not. The people need to get their stories straight
“An unofficial statement that has been circulating since the alleged altercation occurred indicates that Barnhill allegedly called the members of the VFD “worthless volunteers” and stated that the medals on their uniforms are “crap.””
I would like to see any of these over paid pockett padders go into a burning building to save a stranger………
The State of Texas does not do ISO testing. The testing is done by ISO – Insurance Safety Offices Inc. – ISO.com. They are a national testing firm and use a standard set of rules and references. The states have nothing to do with them. They work independently to rate a city’s dispatch, water distribution, fire department and infrastructure to see how well it is protected against fire and other disasters. Insurance agencies use this rating to set how much they charge citizens for insurance.
Now, since the city itself as a governing body does not benefit, cities leave getting ready for the tests to the local fire depts. Part of the tests include checking each and EVERY hydrants operation and flow capabilities. This is also mandated by the NFPA to be done EVERY year. The only way to do that is to go and OPEN each one.
I know all this because we just went from a 6 to a 3 rating and saved our citizens about 30% per year on their insurance rates. We did our testing and so do most all departments. Not the state, not anyone else. ISO reviews the tests, does spot checks and set the rate. Its the same for our city of 5000 as one for 1000 or 50,000.
Please research before you say little fds dont. And little or not…. they save your property and life. Little does not mean unprofessional.
Get your story straight.
I will now get off my soap box.
What gets me in this article is they “had to get the city’s permission before opening the fire hydrants.” What’s that all about?! That’s just plain stupid! I’d bet that would change if one of those city employees house were to catch fire!