By Joey Bunch
The Denver Post
Copyright 2006 The Denver Post
All Rights Reserved
PARKER, Colo. — When Mainstreet was a dirt road a quarter century ago, Parker had a ragtag volunteer fire department that relied on patched-up, secondhand equipment and two firehouses 15 minutes from some homes.
“I asked the (former) chief, ‘How do you sleep at night?”’ recalled Fire Chief Dan Qualman, who joined the department in 1983 when it began the transition to a professional force that today includes 101 firefighters.
The Parker Fire Protection District is doubling the number of firehouses to 12, with the sixth having made its public debut at an open house last weekend.
Authorities hope to have a firehouse within 3 1/2 minutes of at least 70 percent of the homes and businesses in the 105-square-mile district.
By comparison, the Denver Fire Department tries to reach a fire at 85 percent of its homes within four minutes in its more urban, larger district of 154 square miles.
Though each new station costs about $2 million and has at least 10 firefighters, Parker won’t have to borrow a dime beyond its budget - $23 million this year.
“There are a lot of nice homes and businesses that pay a lot of taxes to support our fire protection,” said Parker anti-tax advocate Jim Dawson. “I’d hate to think we have less than the best for what we’re paying.”
The next stations are slated for the Arapahoe Road-Parker Road area, followed by the Canterberry Crossing neighborhood.
The department includes unincorporated areas of eastern Arapahoe and Douglas counties, as well as parts of Centennial and Lone Tree and all of Parker and Foxfield.
The taxes residents pay often are less than they would pay for homeowners insurance if the department was substandard, Qualman said.
With 10 being the worst, a federal study of 839 departments in 2000 found that fire departments that improved their ratings from Class 9 or 10 to Class 7 would create an average household savings of $235 on insurance premiums.
“The insurance company will replace your house and all your possessions,” Qualman said. “We might save them.”
The owner of a $265,000 home would pay $295 a year for the fire district.
The fire department provides emergency medical response and a host of community programs.
Other fire districts in the metro area have had trouble raising money. Last summer, the Mountain View Protection District in Longmont said it would not be able to handle major fires in the fast-growing district after voters rejected a tax increase to hire 18 new firefighters.
“Of all the complaints about taxes I hear, I have never heard anybody complain about the taxes they pay for the fire district,” said Tracy Sherman, president of the Parker department’s nonprofit foundation.