3 north Snohomish County fire districts flirt with merger

Published 8:16 pm Saturday, February 27, 2016

ARLINGTON — Three north Snohomish County fire districts are talking about ways they can work better together.

That conversation could lead to a legal merger.

“We’re not there yet,” Fire Chief Travis Hots said. “We want to date for awhile and work all the bugs out and make sure it’s going to work for us all.”

The talks are between Fire District 19 in Silvana, District 21, which is also known as Arlington Rural, and District 22 in Getchell. Together, they serve some 16,000 people and manage about $3 million of taxes a year.

In early 2014, the Arlington Rural and Getchell districts decided to share Hots as their chief. In 2015, they also began sharing a training officer, a medical services officer and other resources, Hots said.

“It’s worked out really, really well,” he said. “We have consolidated several functions of our agencies to operate more efficiently.”

Hots and Silvana Fire Chief Keith Strotz plan to talk and come up with a written plan. It’s too soon to say what that might look like, Hots said. Eventually, they will take the plan to the three boards of commissioners for discussion.

The three districts “are all at the table on that,” Hots said. “It’s something we’re working on ourselves. We haven’t hired a consultant.”

The three districts altogether have four full-time staff and about 70 part-time and volunteer firefighters.

Rikki King: 425-339-3449; rking@heraldnet.com.