Riverside officials on Sept. 3 discussed the history of its two firehouses and its public safety mutual aid agreements amid some public debate about the potential closure of the station north of the BNSF line.
Riverside is moving forward with its plan to remodel the existing shared fire and police facility attached to Township Hall, though the move will ask voters to approve the plan on their ballots next April.
Officials have said the plan includes closing Fire Station #2 at 60 Pine Ave. due to the inadequate sleeping and living facilities for on-call firefighters staying overnight. The plan has generated some public debate in the form of residents’ opinions published by the Landmark, including one written by Village President Doug Pollock.
At the village board’s Sept. 3 meeting, Public Safety Director Matthew Buckley gave a 23-minute presentation on the history of how Riverside’s firefighters responded to emergencies and why he said the second fire station is unnecessary.
From the 1950s through the 1970s, the village used its tornado siren to notify volunteer firefighters of an emergency so they could respond directly from their homes, as they did not stay on the premises of the station. In the ‘70s and ‘80s, the village also used pagers for that purpose.
In the 1990s, due to many firefighters working outside of the village during the day, Riverside began staffing its firehouses with volunteers from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. Those hours were extended to 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. starting in the 2000s, Buckley said, with firefighters still responding from home after 6 p.m.
Finally, at the start of the 2020s, Riverside shifted to a paid, on-premise model with rotating, full-time staffers, Buckley said.
At some point, the facility at 60 Pine Ave. was converted into Fire Station #2 so that village firefighters could respond to emergencies on both sides of the railroad tracks even if the downtown crossing was blocked by a train.
Now, that station is no longer needed as backup, Buckley said, due to existing mutual aid agreements with surrounding communities. As a member municipality of West Central Consolidated Communications, which dispatches police and fire services, Riverside has equal access to firetrucks from Brookfield, North Riverside and McCook.
“Under the automatic aid [agreements], neighboring resources can be dispatched at the same time as Riverside units,” Buckley said. “The closest appropriate unit will respond, regardless of the municipal boundary.”
As a result, a firetruck from another municipality could respond to the scene of an emergency sooner than a Riverside unit, even if the railroad crossing isn’t blocked. Buckley said some of these neighboring municipalities only have one fire station themselves but haven’t found themselves wanting for another one due to the mutual aid agreements.
He gave trustees an example of a time a Riverside firetruck was the first to the scene of a fire in a neighboring town that does have two firehouses.
“It shows how that does work, even when that neighboring department has two stations, and they still got stuck by the train,” Buckley said. “The closest one will get there first and get to work and take care of whatever the issue may be.”
He said consolidating the fire stations had emerged as the best solution in 2018, when the village had considered all the options for what to do with its two firehouses.
“I personally live on the north side of the tracks on the north side of town. If I didn’t feel comfortable, as a resident or as an employee with combining the two firehouses, I would not be standing up here saying that I believe that is what we need to do here in Riverside,” Buckley said.
Some members of the village board voiced support for the consolidation effort following Buckley’s presentation.
“I also live on the north side of the tracks, and I’m pretty confident that anything that would happen to my house would be responded to quickly with all of our partnerships,” Trustee Cristin Evans said.
“One thing that impresses me is that the public is always asking for more efficiency, more cooperation, less overlap,” Pollock said. “[Through] this auto-aid and mutual aid agreements, we essentially have a regional public safety department, if you will, with our own people dedicated to our village but with the support of … all the area fire stations.”
