Staff writer
A new burn resolution proposed less than a month ago has already prompted a complaint to county commissioners.
Nathan Brunner, co-owner of Fire For Hire, a controlled burn service, told commissioners Monday he’d already run into issues with the way dispatchers responded when he called in to report a planned burn.
“Dispatch advised we could not burn due to wind conditions,” Brunner said. “I tried talking to dispatch, I got shut down, they acted like they were frustrated with me.”
Brunner said dispatchers were applying portions of a 2014 burn resolution and portions of the newly proposed burn resolution.
“It appears to me they’re going off different parts of different resolutions,” Brunner said.
Sheriff Rob Craft said he wants the burn resolution to be specific so dispatchers have no confusion about what is meant.
“I want something simple and clear that they can go by,” Craft said.
Brunner said he also recommends a bigger window to start a fire than the 30 minutes allowed by the resolution, because cell phone service in the county is unreliable and it might take longer to reach the fire site from a place where a phone call can be made.
Landowner Leonard Jirak said he’d been notified he needs to get his CRP land taken care of, but hadn’t been able to do it.
“We can’t burn outside of your restrictions, but if your restrictions are too tight, we can’t burn,” Jirak said.
In other matters, commissioners heard a report from economic development director Teresa Huffman about recent and upcoming activities in her department; compared the county’s emergency medical service struggles with EMS struggles in regional counties; voted to permit landowner Gary Diepenbrock to continue with building a new house on his property; signed paperwork for insurance on land purchased as a right of way on 190th Rd. where a washed-out section is being rebuilt; and discussed where money could be found to cover a large increase in employee health insurance and proposed housing for EMS employees.