Central Fire reaffirms purchase of air packs from MSA

By Kevin O’Brien

After three months of back-and-forth debates about what type of air packs to buy for local firefighters, members of the Central Fire and EMS board on Tuesday ended up voting exactly the same way they did back in February.

By a vote of 4-3, the board reaffirmed its decision to purchase MSA-brand self-contained breathing apparatus (SCBAs) from MacQueen Equipment for a total cost of $278,783. The big difference from February is that MacQueen agreed to sell the district 64 bottles to go with the 32 air packs and 60 facemasks included in the original offer.

Initially, the sales rep from MacQueen told the board that new bottles would have cost $188,000 this year – or $200,000 if the district waited another 10 years. After board chairman Larry Oehmichen got quotes from competing vendors, MacQueen offered a buy-one, get-one deal on the bottles, significantly lowering the overall price.

“It’s amazing how much these prices dropped after we started getting some different prices,” Oehmichen said.

Ultimately, the district will pay just under $200 more than what it agreed to pay back in February, a decision that was later confirmed by a majority of the seven municipalities that make up the district. However, purchasing new SCBAs through MacQueen will cost about $73,000 more than a competing offer from Dalmation Fire Equipment, which was willing to sell the district 32 used air packs, plus 64 bottles, for around $200,000.

Board members spent a good chunk of Tuesday’s meeting going over offers from various vendors and picking apart the details to make sure the district was getting the best deal.

Firefighters have expressed a strong preference for MSA-brand SCBAs, which is what they currently use when entering buildings during a fire, so the debate mostly came

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down to a decision between Mac-Queen and Dalmation.

District chief Joe Mueller confirmed that he tried on one of the used SCBAs that Dalmation sent to Oehmichen as an example of their products.

“I could tell it was used, but it was in good enough shape,” he said.

Oehmichen said he was still not happy with MacQueen’s sales pitch to the board back in February and the resulting decision by the board to go with the company’s offer without first checking with other vendors. He was able to pause the purchase long enough for a vendor selling Draeger-brand SCBAs to come and have firefighters try on those packs, but a majority still preferred the MSAs. Abbotsford Mayor Jim Weix more or less ended the debate by asking Mueller a straightforward question.

“You converse with the guys on the fire department considerably more than we do. Which ones do they want?” he asked.

When Mueller confirmed that a majority of them prefer MSAs, Weix said “end of discussion” and made a motion to purchase the SCBAs from MacQueen.

Still, it was pointed out that Dalmation was offering the same model of MSAs, just seven years older. Mueller, however, noted that MacQueen was offering a 15-year “bumper to bumper” warranty on their MSAs, while Dalmation’s warranty was only five years.

Ultimately, representatives from the cities of Abbotsford and Colby and the towns of Hull and Holton voted in favor of Weix’s motion, while the representatives from the towns of Colby and Mayville and the village of Dorchester voted no.

“I’d say get them ordered then, Joe,” Oehmichen told Mueller.

Because a majority of the seven municipalities had already approved the purchase from Mac-Queen, the proposal will not have to go back to the boards and councils for another vote.

Financial warnings

Before the board even started discussing the SCBA purchases, Oehmichen laid out the district’s current financial status and warned of a possible deficit by the end of the year if revenues from the ambulance service don’t keep up with expenses.

Oehmichen said the district’s 2025 budget is $724,600, with monthly expenses averaging about $60,383. With the unbudgeted SCBA purchases factored in, he said the district is projected to spend $851,499 by the end of the year and take in $655,132 in revenue, leaving a deficit of $186,267.

This does not take into account how much income will be generated by the ambulanc service in the second half of the years, which means the district could still break even and cover the shortfall.

“If it doesn’t make that much, we don’t have enough money to pay the bills in December,” he said. “If it makes a little more than that, we’re going to have a little left at the end of the year. That’s how tight this is going to be.”

Oehmichen said the district does have the option to borrow money, but that would require approval from a majority of the cities, towns and the village of Dorchester.

“My municipality is going to ask why we’re borrowing money,” he said. “Maybe some other municipalities will ask that very same question.”

Leonard Haas, a town supervisor from Hull, questioned whether it was necessarily a bad thing for the district to take out a loan if it needs new equipment for firefighters.

“So, you have to go borrow a little money,” he said to Oehmichen. “Did you ever have to borrow money when you ran your farm or your business?”

Oehmichen said the district is not a private business and needs to look out for taxpayers. He does not believe this was done with the SCBA purchases.

“As you can see, this board was not informed enough to make a decision,” he said. “That’s why we’re now going to be in a financial deficit.”

Haas, however, said Oehmichen should not be the only one making decisions for the board, and questioned whether he was doing what’s best for the people responding to fires.

“Are you out there fighting fires? Are you going inside that house?” he asked Oehmichen.

Oehmichen pushed back on the idea that he or the board doesn’t want to spend the money needed to provide firefighters with the best equipment, listing a number of high-dollar purchases the district has made going back to 2018, which have totalled nearly $1.5 million.

“How much more do you want to spend?” he exclaimed.

Going forward, Oehmichen said he would like the board to adopt a purchasing policy modeled after the state of Wisconsin’s bidding and procurement manual.

Under the policy, purchases under $5,000 would not require prior authorization, but anything over that would require a minimum of three quotes. For anything over $50,000, a formal competition process would be required involving requests for proposals and sealed bids.

“None of this has got to do with emergency purchases,” he clarified. “That overrides everything.”

Oehmichen asked board members to take the proposed policy back to their municipalities for their review and said he would have it on next month’s board agenda for possible approval.

“I’m strongly urging that we get this in our policy,” he said.