Agenda - Planning Commission - 10/19/1999 - Special Meeting

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XV. June 17, 1999 Draft PUBLIC FACILITIES A. City Administration Ramsey City Hall houses approximately 20 full time and 3 part-time employees in approximately 6,000 square feet of office and meeting space. The City of Ramsey operates under the "council-administrator" form of municipal government in which the City Council and Mayor appoint a professional administrator to carry out the City's wishes. Departments of community development, engineering, planning and zoning, public works, finance, human resources and other ancillary services support the City Administrator. The City employs a total of 49 full time employees. B. Fire and Rescue One fire station currently services the City of Ramsey. Its central location at Ramsey City Hall makes it capable of responding to the entire City within 10 to 12 minutes thus achieving a fire service rating of either 6 or 9 depending upon distance from a hydrant. The Ramsey Fire Department is comprised of 1 full time and 28 volunteer fire-fighters who are on call. The department maintains the following fire and rescue equipment: · 1 Fire engine with out aerial ladders or telescoping ladders. · 2 Tanker trucks · Grass truck Reserve truck The Ramsey Fire Department responds to approximately 370 calls per year including 183 fire related calls, 125 ambulance emergency calls and 62 misceIlaneous calls. The Ramsey Fire Department is assisted by and assists on occasion the Anoka-Champlin Fire Department, the Andover Fire Department, the Oak Grove Fire Department and the Elk River Fire Department. Emergency ambulance service is provided to the City through contract and is able to respond to any area within the community with a 10 minute. response time. Hospital services are provided by nearby hospitals in Coon Rapids and Elk River. In order to improve response times to existing and future residential and commercial development within the community, the City of Ramsey is currently in the process of siting a second fire station to serve western portions of Ramsey and would house one part- time and 2 volunteer fire fighters, and 1 fire engine with 1,500 gallons per minute pumping capacity, one tanker truck and one grass truck. One of the critical issues with regards to fire service response time is being able to cost effectively provide fire protecti6n to low density residential development in the rural areas of Ramsey. Improving response time to the rural areas poses the greatest level of difficulty because of the lack of an interconnecting street pattern. An area of concern is the northern limits of the Northfork subdivision, which is only accessible via the southern collector roadway of 153~a and the local north south road of Andrie Street. Siting of the new fire station in the western portion of Ramsey will increase response time to this area by 4 to 6 minutes. Ramsey Comprehensive Plan Page XV- I