Countywide : Implementation of Fire Fees Is Delayed

Collection of new county fire fees levied on cities has been postponed until July 1 in order to study their fairness, officials said.

County Fire Capt. Dan Young said several cities requested the delay after the new fees were adopted by the County Board of Supervisors last July.

“That’s just good business,” Young said. “When they see their constituents getting charged, they ask, ‘What services are they getting for that?’ And that’s a fair question. We may modify the cost of some of the services,” based on the study’s conclusions.

Irvine City Manager Paul O. Brady Jr. called his city “one of the biggest instigators of the study,” saying that it might end up subsidizing fire services elsewhere if the fee schedule is not changed.

“Because we are a rich city . . . Irvine tends to pay more into the structural fire fund than, possibly, it gets in direct services,” he said.

Young said the new fees, which were supposed to take effect Jan. 1, are designed to spur compliance with fire codes and to offset the expense of responding to false alarms and inspecting businesses that repeatedly fail to meet department regulations.

Fourteen cities are under contract with the county for fire services, including Irvine, Stanton, Seal Beach, Tustin and Yorba Linda.

Young said he did not know how much money the Fire Department would lose by delaying the implementation of the new fees.