Agenda - Council - 03/09/1999 - Laserfiche WebLink

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Parks Ramsey is fortunate in being the home to 522 acres of State and County park space in addition to more than 500 acres of City owned parks and trails. Included in the City inventory is almost twelve miles of trails and more than 125 acres of active park spaces. The balance of the system is either yet to be developed or dedicated as nature preserves. It is the developed park space that receives an increasing amount of maintenance as demand rises. To keep pace with the increasing number of park and trail users, the city uses a threefold approach. " The first is committing adequate maintenance hours to the existing system. Most of these new hours are provided by high school and college students during the summer, along with volunteers provide important contributions year-round. The second is to meet service expectations to improve existing parks. In 1998, most of Ramsey" 19 actively used parks benefited from development this year ranging from simple landscaping to the renovation of the 25 year old Peltzer Park. After a survey of the large neighborhoods around Peltzer Park, a park plan was implemented resulting in a $26,000 play structure, both with woodchip and blacktop paths and complementing landscaping. The third and most prominent park activity in 1998 was the new addition to the park and trail system. Alpine Parks irrigated baseball and soccer/football fields were finished early in the year. A shelter, paved trail connections and tree planting in 1999 will complete this first phase. Trail construction in 1998 consisted of one mile of trail from County Road/483 to County Road #56 along County Road/4116 and completion of another half mile segment further east of /4116. In addition, a trail from 149th Avenue was built down to/4116 adjacent to County Road #56. Another north/south segment east of Regency Ponds subdivision was finished at this same time. Fire Ramsey's Fire Department is considered "volunteer" or paid on call. This means that the 30-member fire service does not regularly staff the fire station. Instead, fire emergencies are communicated through the 911 system, which is administered ~.through Anoka County Central Communications. Ramsey Firefighters carry a fire service pager that receives the dispatch fi.om Anoka County advising them of the emergency. Firefighters then respond to the fire station, dress in turnout gear, staff the appropriate vehicle and respond to the incident. Each member of the fire department must pass standard firefighting classes and, at a minimum, become state certified in Firefighter 1 and First Responder. Training is also received in specialized areas such as hazardous materials, search and rescue, auto extrication, water rescue and fire sprimkler system, in addition to many other topics. In addition to the numerous hours spent on training, fire fighters obviously spend considerable time responding to calls. As a result, Ramsey receives highly professional service without the expense of supporting a full-time department. The number of responses has typically increased through the years as the table below indicates: