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Questions about Improving Fire and EMS Response

This page has questions that citizens have asked, and answers provided by our team, the Sierra FPD staff, or the county staff. If YOU have a question that is not answered, click HERE and ask it. We'll get the answer and send it to you.

I live close to Sierra Station 38, which you are proposing to abandon when the new station is built at Thomas Creek. Why should I support this?

This question was asked at the Galena CAB on 5/15/2009, and it is an excellent question.  To answer it, let’s consider an emergency that occurs in Montreux:

Montreux is a long, narrow subdivision (yep, no matter what your real estate agent told you, it is a subdivision, just like Levittown) with a single controlled entrance at the north end.  So to analyze this we need to think about where your house is; let’s consider three locations:

1. At the north end, say at Rue du Parc and Bordeaux.
2. At the middle, say at Bordeaux and Montreux Lane
3. At the south end, say at Margaux Road and LaTour Way

Today’s Emergency
Presently, if you summon emergency assistance, that assistance travels up or down Mt. Rose Highway (NV431), turns south on Bordeaux Road, and then drives to your home.  The distances and emergency vehicle travel times (assuming 20 mph speed within Montreux) from the NV431 intersection to these three locations is:

There are presently only two engine companies near enough to Montreux to be dispatched and arrive in a reasonable time: Sierra Station 38, on NV431 east of Montreux, and Truckee Meadows 14, at Old Virginia and Damonte Ranch Road at the bottom of the hill.  To the intersection of Bordeaux and NV431, Sierra 38 has a travel time of about 1.8 minutes; TM 14 has a travel time of about 12 minutes.  But note that Sierra 38 is out on several calls a day, and TM 14 is the third busiest fire station in the entire County, so whether they are in station or not at the time YOUR emergency occurs is an issue. 
Total travel time to the emergency from each station is then

When you consider what will happen in an emergency, you need to think about the first responder (for a medical emergency) and the second engine company (for a house fire). National standards are 8 minutes for a first responder, and 12 minutes for the second engine company.  And only Sierra has paramedics on their fire engines, which means that if Engine 38 is busy, you are left with the Galena Volunteers who have to be paged and then respond; most of them are also paramedics.  While they are closer than TM 14, they are at work or in other locations, and have to respond to their equipment before they can start for your emergency.

When the New Station is Built
The plan that Sierra’s present Chief has put forth is to staff Station 39 on Joy Lake Road and the new station, and return Station 38 to its owner, the Galena Volunteer Fire Department.  The Volunteers would then respond from that station.
But to consider how long the paid career staff would take to reach these three locations, you need to think about how they would enter Montreux.  Because there now would be two fire stations near the emergency, the most likely initial response would be from Station 39 on Joy Lake Road.  An engine responding from Station 39 would not travel up Joy Lake Road and then east on NV 431 to reach a location within Montreux. Instead, the response would be north on Joy Lake, then northeast on Austrian Pine, east on Piney Creek, and finally into Montreux at Gate 10 on Piney Creek (which is a fire department emergency gate) coming out on Alpes Way.  An alternative response would travel down Austrian Pine, turn east of Philoree Lane, and enter Montreux via Gate 23 (also an emergency gate) on Nestle Court.  Distances to the three model locations from Station 39 using those routes (assuming an average 25 mph throughout the route) are:

A response from the new station would come across Thomas Creek Road, then west (uphill) on NV 431, and into the main gate of Montreux. This takes about 8 minutes.  With this scenario, the revised response times from the two closest stations would be:

Analysis and Comment

It has long been evident that having a long narrow residential area with only one entrance/exit is not ideal for emergency response. This analysis shows that, between them, Sierra Fire and the Montreux Homeowner’s Association needs to select and improve one of the two gates that allow emergency access through the west side of the development.  If this is done, the new fire station will provide both initial response and second engine response to nearly all of the development in times that are less than the national standard.

Why hasn't the county anticipated the need for fire stations and built them already?

The Sierra Fire Protection District used to be run by the Nevada Department of Forestry (NDF), and was primarily responsible for defending the valley against forest fires coming down from the hills. When new developments were proposed and built, NDF did not require new fire stations, and the county did not have the authority to do so. Now that SFPD is an “all risks” department, the need for additional stations is evident, and this station is essential to “catch up”.  In the future, according to some county officials, developers will be asked to provide the needed infrastructure, or their projects will not be approved by the SFPD and the county.

Why are there two county fire departments?

As noted, the SFPD used to be part of the Nevada Department of Forestry.  What is presently called Truckee Meadows Fire Protection District (TMFPD) was the first county fire department, and it, too, was originally part of the NDF.  A number of years ago, the county contracted with Reno to run TMFPD, and when the NDF gave up running SFPD, Reno did not want to take it on.  Now, there is a study in progress to look at combining the two county fire agencies, and also to examine who ought to run them. And, actually, counting Incline Fire, there are three county fire departments!

I thought REMSA provided all the emergency medical responses?  What actually is REMSA’s role? What response time does REMSA have to meet to my home?  Which areas of the county does REMSA have mandated response times to?

The Regional Emergency Medical Service Authority (REMSA) was given an exclusive agreement to transport patients by the Washoe County Department of Health a number of years ago.  Thus, they are essentially an ambulance service, rather than a fire rescue service.  Within Washoe County, except Incline Village, the fire departments are not allowed to transport patients. Incline is allowed to because REMSA decided not to serve Incline. 

Because REMSA is not a fire rescue service, their crews cannot rescue people from buildings or vehicles; if the ambulance arrives before the fire crew, REMSA personnel have to wait for the fire crew if the patient is not easily accessible.

REMSA operates ambulances, each staffed per state requirements with at least one paramedic and one emergency medical technician (less qualified than a paramedic). REMSA also operates 3 helicopters, called Careflight, staffed with paramedics and flight nurses.

Finally, REMSA operates its own dispatch center. If you call "911" for a medical emergency, the 911 operator will determine that you need emergency medical help, and will then transfer you to the REMSA dispatch center, where you will be interrogated again.

REMSA receives no funding from the county or the cities, and its only income is from the patients it transports.
In exchange for its franchise, REMSA must respond to all medical emergencies.

REMSA's web site (click here to go to it) says that they respond to "all life threatening emergencies within 8 minues" but that is not true. The Health Department franchise requires them to respond to “life threatening emergencies” within 8 minutes in an area that is essentially the city limits of Reno north of Huffaker Lane, and monitors their responses in that area.  In the rest of the County, there are 15 and 20 minute zones, and “best efforts” zones, and in those areas REMSA is not even monitored for performance.  However, James Gubbels of REMSA states that usually their ambulances arrive before the required maximum time. Most of Arrowcreek is in the 20 minute zone.  Galena, St. James’s Village, Callahan, and Montreux are in the “best efforts” zone.

Why does SFPD have paramedics, and TMFPD does not?

Residents served by the SFPD agreed to pay for a paramedic on each fire engine, because most of the area covered by the SFPD is in one of the long response time zones for REMSA. TMFPD has a similar situation, but because it is operated by Reno, which depends on REMSA for advanced life support in medical emergencies, it does not have paramedics; most TMFPD engines have EMT-IIs, who provide basic life support. If you have a heart attack, you need to have a paramedic, so in some parts of the TMFPD coverage area, a SFPD engine with paramedic is also dispatched to medical emergencies because it will arrive long before REMSA.

Where are the volunteer stations? Don’t the volunteers help?  If we have volunteers, do we really need another fire station?

With the SFPD, there is one volunteer station close by.  Station 381 is north of Mt. Rose Highway approximately at Fawn Lane about a quarter mile east of SFPD Station 38, and is operated by the Galena VFD (click here for their web site).  There are three others nearby: SFPD Station 301 is on Bellevue Road, halfway to Carson City west of US 395, and is operated by the Bellevue VFD. There are also two Pleasant Valley VFD Stations, one (237) on US 395 near Pagni Lane, and one (227) in New Washoe City approximately on the edge of Washoe Lake. There used to be another volunteer station on Geiger Grade (224), but that station depended to TMFPD for support, and Reno declined to support it anymore, so it closed two years ago, and what was left of the staff and equipment moved to the Pleasant Valley VFD. The map also shows another SFPD volunteer station (382) on Callahan Road, but it is a building currently used only for storage.

Volunteers are trained and certified fire fighters with the same training and certification as the career staff. Many are also certified paramedics. So when the volunteers respond, a truly professional group comes to your home to help you. Galena VFD responds to nearly as many calls in a year as does SFPD Station 38, so they are an extremely valuable resource for an area that does not have nearly enough career firefighters.

Where does the staff for the new station come from? Will the SFPD increase our taxes for that, too?

The additional fire station will allow the Chief to move staff around to provide optimum protection. And eventually, the current financial crisis will abate, home values and tax revenues will increase, and a little more money to hire and pay staff will become available.  But, there is no plan to increase the tax rate that supports Sierra.

The present SFPD plan is to staff the new station with the crew that currently staffs Station 38 on Mt. Rose Highway, and to use other existing staff to provide staff at Station 39 on Joy Lake Road and to maintain staffing at the other existing fire stations

Additionally, since the new station will be able to respond more effectively into the area served by Truckee Meadows, Sierra expects to recoup some of its costs in operating the station from the other fire organization.

I can drive from my home to the fire station quickly. Why does your chart show a longer response time?

Fire engines are large trucks, carrying rescue equipment and a crew of four. They go up hills slowly. They have to slow down for speed bumps, corners, and people who are not paying attention to their lights and sirens.

The charts for response time were developed by a computer analysis of the roads in the SFPD, and then confirmed by inspection and comparison with actual recorded response times for emergency calls.