By CARL F. WELSER
Where do fire departments come from? Where do they go? Sixty-five years ago, in August 1946, a group of men got together and started the Hamburg (MI) Fire Department, Incorporated (HFD, Inc.), the only privately owned and operated fire department in Michigan. From day one, the department was staffed entirely by unpaid volunteers. It worked perfectly well that way for almost 55 years. But now, it’s out of business.
In June 2000, my article “The Middletown Mistake: Spotting It and Avoiding It” appeared in Fire Engineering. Despite the magazine’s worldwide readership, few readers would have understood the true nature of the article. Even fewer could have known that the story about the Middletown Volunteer Fire Department (MVFD) actually chronicled the last desperate days of HFD, Inc.
The article began with the statement, “Say farewell to the Middletown Volunteer Fire Department (MVFD) and to the people who staff it day and night—24/7, as they say in modern management. Its days are dwindling.” Exactly one year later, on June 30, 2001, HFD, Inc. passed into history as an operational fire and rescue service. All of its hard-earned equipment passed into the hands of the brand-new Hamburg Township (MI) Fire Department (HTFD) at midnight.
HFD, Inc. volunteers started their private fire department back in 1946 because they were independent thinkers who knew they could do it. They were also annoyed at the response times and the prices being charged by nearby Brighton (MI) Fire Department for dousing a fire in Hamburg. Some may challenge these assessments, but it remains a fixed part of local lore.
At the time my article first appeared, storm clouds were gathering over the future of HFD, Inc. Leaders saw the warning signs, but they underestimated the significance of those signs. The leaders’ ultimate mistake, not described in my original article, was that they spotted it far too late to avert its consequences. A year after the original article appeared, HFD, Inc. was gone.
The Village of Hamburg represents a wide spot in one corner of a 36-square-mile township of the same name. Because of multiple lakes and streams connected to the Huron River, a substantial resort community developed early on. In those early days, Hamburg’s population more than doubled around Memorial Day, as city folks came out to their cottages. After Labor Day, the population shrank back to winter proportions. An old set of grappling hooks used for recovering drowning victims hung around the original station for years, mute testimony to the days before dive teams were developed.
HFD, Inc. commenced operations on a shoestring budget; the volunteers dug into their own pockets and coaxed a few extra dollars out of their neighbors’ wallets to buy some firefighting equipment. “Uncle Chuck” Davis, the local postmaster, set out canisters in local business places to gather donations. They worked for nothing more than the satisfaction of serving their community. With their own hands, members eventually built their own two-story fire hall with three truck bays; a basement; and a meeting room on the second floor, which occasionally doubled as a dance hall. Older fire service veterans everywhere will easily recollect their own versions of similar efforts. These acts have been replicated in smaller communities all over the country for more than a century.
HFD, Inc.’s first fire apparatus was a big gasoline-powered water pump with several hundred feet of war-surplus 2½-inch hose mounted on a two-wheeled trailer. Department members were required to equip their personal vehicles with trailer hitches, which allowed any one of them to haul the pump trailer to one of the many lakes and streams lacing the township when water was needed at a fire scene. After a few years of self-support, the township started contributing a few thousand dollars a year to HFD, Inc. Every little bit helped, even though the firefighters remained unpaid volunteers.
By 1970, the township was contributing $150 per fire call and $75 for “resuscitator” calls. In earlier days, the fire calls were mainly for grass fires, while the resuscitator calls were mostly for strokes and heart attacks. Many older fire departments may have some version of an E&J Resuscitator in their attics. The mechanical resuscitator, also known as a pulmotor, basically served as a public relations device for pumping oxygen into an already deceased patient before the days of cardiopulmonary resuscitation. Back in those days, Hamburg’s only available ambulance service was linked to a hearse from a local funeral home.
Some experts may jump to the unfortunate conclusion that a privately owned and operated fire department in a suburban township would end up as some kind of lark. Nothing could be further from the truth. Always innovative, HFD, Inc. earned the radio designation “Hamburg Station One” by being the county’s first department to equip its apparatus with radios. Also, it was the first in the county to require basic first responder medical training for all members. Finally, it developed and trained a responding women’s unit (nicknamed “10-W”), integrated women into full membership, and equipped rescue vehicles with semiautomatic defibrillators.
By 1990, Hamburg’s population mushroomed to more than 20,000, making it the largest municipality in Livingston County, Michigan; the number of fire and rescue calls increased proportionately. By 1997, the township’s per-call stipend for HFD, Inc. amounted to nearly $200,000 per year, severely straining the township’s general fund. By the mid-’90s, it became increasingly apparent that the township’s general fund could no longer support the fire department adequately. In 1997, the township board floated a combined fire and police millage proposal, hoping to relieve some pressure on the general fund. That proposal failed, perhaps because police millages are not so readily favored by voters.
However, in 1998, HFD, Inc. members partnered with township officers on an exclusive $1 million proposal to support the fire department for 10 years. Willing volunteers staked the reputation of the department as well as their personal integrity on the validity of that 10-year millage proposal. Two homegrown catchphrases drove the campaign: “Neighbors Helping Neighbors” and “You Call, We’ll Come.” Both statements were absolutely true.
Voters passed the millage handily, generating approximately $500,000 in the first year alone. Everyone was elated. However, the end for HFD, Inc. lay buried in the success of that millage. Too much money was suddenly flowing into the treasury, all of it dedicated to the operation of the fire department. The township board quickly took notice of the amount of cash accumulating.
My June 2000 article demonstrated the fictional MVFD officers’ problems with forward planning. In the end, HFD, Inc.’s real mistake was much simpler: They got blindsided. They realized too late that they should have negotiated a firm agreement with the township to extend their contract equal in length to the 10-year duration of the millage before agreeing to help pass the millage proposal.
In its earlier days, HFD, Inc. served the township’s people through the gentleman’s agreement: “We’ll be your fire department. You support us as much as you can.” A handshake was good enough for everyone. It didn’t hurt that the old chief was also an elected township trustee for many years. Those early decades of casual working agreements were the key to understanding the real “Middletown Mistake” made by HFD, Inc.
By 1999, with the millage already enforced for one year, a startling amount of money was piling up, all at the fire department’s disposal (according to the millage proposal’s wording). With that much cash at stake, the township board and HFD, Inc.’s representatives began quibbling over the exact wording of their annual contract. Contract negotiations quickly morphed from a simple handshake to a lengthy document. Note that the incumbent township supervisor was a retired lawyer.
My June 2000 article accurately portrayed the future planning activities of HFD, Inc. officers. MVFD members developed intricate plans for projecting future call volumes; estimating response times; and learning how to squirrel away excess funds in escrow accounts, which could be drawn on in the future, realizing that it would eventually become necessary to add paid or part-paid personnel to their roster. They were good business people; their careful stewardship of taxpayer dollars remains without question. However, they had overlooked the need for a tight 10-year contract that matched the duration of the millage.
Recognizing the growing threat to their survival, HFD, Inc.’s leaders became distracted over philosophical issues about the relationship between paid personnel and volunteers. The volunteers were especially concerned about integrating paid personnel into the purely volunteer organization without destroying the spirit of volunteerism.
Any volunteer administrator understands how volunteers need to be needed. The problem facing the MVFD was addressed in the June 2000 article: “If the volunteer model is to survive, then stipended personnel—whether full or part-time employees—must be engaged with the firm stipulation that their job is to support the work of the volunteers. When a volunteer appears on a scene, a stipended person must be willing to step back and let the volunteer move into that position. Blunt questions flush the central issues out of hiding. Do such people exist? Can such people coexist?”
From the outset, the first stipend personnel hired by HFD, Inc. were not clearly informed that they were employed to facilitate the volunteer effort, not to replace the volunteers. In the end, the stipending of particular personnel to respond to routine emergencies on behalf of the whole department helped seal the fate of HFD, Inc.
At the time of the transition, HFD, Inc.’s roster listed 35 voting members and 18 apprentices—a total of 53 personnel. According to the rules of incorporation for a 501.c(4) not-for-profit corporation in Michigan, a ballot can be taken among the voting members to dissolve operations and turn all the equipment over to “an organization of similar purpose,” meaning, in this case, the township. That vote total split the membership: 15 against, 14 with, and six abstaining or unavailable.
As a full-fledged fire and rescue operation, HFD, Inc. passed into history at midnight on July 1, 2001. HFD, Inc.’s ousted officers realized they might have avoided the demise of their organization if they had insisted on a contract term equal to the 10-year duration of the millage before agreeing to help pass the millage.
There are two interpretations regarding HFD, Inc.’s transition to a township entity. Some believe it was caused by the township officials’ greed in wanting full control of the millage money. Township officials might defend their actions by claiming concern for closer scrutiny of millage money. At the time of its transition, HFD, Inc. boasted substantial assets. The seven vehicles of various types with associated equipment, a full array of member turnout gear, and radio and paging equipment such as individual pagers put its estimated value at $2 million plus another $500,000 in real property and savings accounts. These assets were bought over many years by a procession of volunteers.
Older members, mostly long gone from the volunteer fire service, are still trying to understand the thoughts of the younger members, who voted to give away the only private fire department in Michigan. Some still wonder whether particular inducements about the possibility of exciting career jobs might have been implied to ambitious youngsters.
Of the seven Hamburg Township board members who presided over HFD, Inc.’s demise, one remains in office. The original township supervisor soon found work elsewhere and appointed a paid deputy to complete his first and only term in office. Only three of the 15 members who voted to surrender the operation of HFD, Inc. remain with HFD today. The remaining 12 quit, moved away, or were dismissed in the intervening eight years.
Oddly enough, HFD, Inc. was undercut by a seven-member Republican township board serving in a largely Republican county at the same time Republican Governor John Engler was touting the wisdom of turning community services into private enterprise. Ironically, HFD, Inc. had already acted in the public interest as a shining example of private enterprise for more than half a century.
CARL F. WELSER is a 35-year fire service veteran with the Hamburg (MI) Fire Department, Incorporated (HFD, Inc.), serving 18 of those years as a training officer. He also served two years with the Hamburg Township (MI) Fire Department. Welser is also a retired pastor and has master’s degrees in divinity and biology.
