EVERGREEN — Evergreen may be an unincorporated community just outside of Kalispell, but that doesn't mean it relies on city resources. The area has its own fire district, and that fire district is in trouble and needs the community's help.
"I think it's important that we tell our story and let the community know of the struggles that we are facing right now," said Evergreen Fire Rescue Chief Craig Williams.
The district — which is run by a board of trustees — recently lost a chunk of funding, resulting in 10 personnel cuts, two per shift.
“It really does become a safety issue for us. And so we are having to do more with less," said Williams.
The fire district lost 40% of its funding in August of 2023 when Logan Health started its own EMS transport and stopped paying Evergreen for the service.
The department has worked hard to find alternate funding — rather than raising taxes—- through interfacility programs and sending firefighters to wildfires.
“You know, any fire station is based on teamwork and so we all absorb all the things necessary within that. However, when you do reduce staffing, and it just brings on, you know, so much more workload, and.. call volume is increasing. And we're basically doing an increase in call volume with the same amount of staff that we had in 2019,” said Williams.
Another alternate source of income is mutual aid response. Evergreen supplies mutual aid to multiple surrounding districts but this too could become impossible if they do not have sufficient staffing.
“We all participate in mutual aid and that's important because nobody can really do everything themselves. So mutual aid is an important part but we've got to establish you know, the basis of solid funding within each district and to be able to provide mutual aid also requires adequate staffing,” said Williams.
Evergreen currently has a levy to fund the fire department, but it is only a 10-year levy and will expire in 2029. The new proposed levy would be a permanent levy with an increase in mills equating to $53.49 per year per $100,000 of taxable home value.
“Ultimately, this comes down to the decision of the taxpayers of Evergreen and are they willing to adequately fund the services that they've grown accustomed to?" Williams said. "And at the end of the day, it's going to be their decision of what services they want from us.”
If this levy revision does not pass and ends in 2029, Williams says that the Evergreen Fire District will most likely shut down.
“It would be very difficult one day to not be able to respond and I think we're approaching that day due to our call volume and with our staffing that there will come a day, unfortunately, where we may not be able to respond. - Evergreen Fire Rescue Chief Craig Williams
The Evergreen Fire District levy revision will be a special mail-in election. Ballots will be sent out the second week of April and will be due on May 7, 2024. Visit https://www.evergreenfire.org/ to learn more about the levy request.
