A plan to hire nine career firefighters accounts for half of Williston’s $1.57 million proposed budget increase that voters will consider on Town Meeting Day.
The proposed hires are driving a 42% increase to fire and EMS spending — up to $3.2 million — as Williston is among the Vermont municipalities grappling with reductions to their volunteer firefighting forces.
In a packet describing the budget to voters, Town Manager Erik Wells said the proposal is part of an effort to “focus on retention and addition of public safety resources to assist in meeting in service demands.”
The current system, he said, is “no longer sustainable” because of its overreliance on on-call staff, “capacity challenges” and “community need.”
“The goal with additional career staff is to create a more effective level of response with added depth daily for the Department,” he wrote.
Overall, about half of the $13 million budget would be paid for by property taxes. It calls for a 4-cent increase to the tax rate, up to about 31 cents per $100 of assessed valuation.
That amounts to about a $932 annual property tax bill for the owner of a home valued at $302,000, which is the median in Williston, according to Wells’ packet — representing an increase of $115 per year.
Revenue from other sources — including funding from the American Rescue Plan Act, the town’s optional sales tax, grants and other funds — would offset the rest of the budget spending.
In addition to fire and EMS, nine other town departments also would see increases, with the majority of the increases going toward staffing salaries. New positions include an energy and community services planner, a police dispatcher and a new parks and recreation employee.
Elsewhere on the ballot, voters also will consider a proposal to purchase a new town ambulance for up to $280,000.
The heightened demand for new town employees has been amplified by the Covid-19 pandemic, although staffing issues have been a growing problem for Williston’s fire department for years.
“Call member staff” are volunteers who assist in responding to calls for service. Throughout the past five years, the fire department’s call member staff rapidly decreased with “from over 30 members to currently 11, and as low as six last year,” according to the budget packet.
These staffing shortages are occurring at the same time as Williston’s population continues to increase, with 1,200 new residents projected to move to Williston by the end of the next five fiscal years, according to the packet.
The town’s proposal to hire nine new firefighters is based on the recommendations of a report conducted by public safety consulting firm AP Triton last year.
The new hires would increase staffing to seven career firefighters/EMTs per shift.
In Vermont, 87.8% of fire departments are volunteer staffed (compared to 70.4% nationally) while 1.5% are exclusively career staffed (compared to a 9.1% national average), according to the National Fire Department Registry.
Williston’s Town Meeting Day voting will take place in person at the Vermont National Guard Armory on Williston Road on Tuesday, March 1, from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m., with early and absentee voting also an option. Absentee ballots can be ordered through emailing or calling Sarah Mason, Williston’s town clerk, or by visiting Vermont’s Secretary of State’s website.
