Back-to-back legal claims by the sales tax breadwinners in Jerome against the town's fire department surely points to the need for a fix in the way fire code enforcement is dished out in the mountainside community.
This is not going to be a treatise on who's right and who's wrong in the dispute involving the Jerome Fire Department vs. the Haunted Hamburger or the Grand Hotel. Those fights will be settled in a court of law.
But what's unsettling about both cases is that they got to this point. Notices of claim and lawsuits between businesses and the fire department are not what we are used to seeing in the Verde Valley.
The mantra of fire protection professionals is that you obtain fire code compliance through education. Before citations and notices to cease and desist are handed out and the subsequent lawsuits filed, Jerome needs to make sure that it has gone above and beyond to communicate its concerns with business owners and work toward solutions that satisfy the concerns of public safety and the realities of operating a business.
In this era, such an education process does not begin and end with the fire chief or the police chief. Jerome now has a professional manager running the show. She is highly skilled in resolving conflict, explaining the law and looking at the big picture. Before any enforcement edicts are issued, the town manager must give her consent.
With fire code issues in Jerome, both town officials and business owners need to always remember that the town offers unique logistical nightmares when it comes to public safety issues. The reality check litmus test always involves a balancing act between buildings and an infrastructure constructed before there was such a thing as a fire code and the modern requirements of public safety.
Let's be real: Would you like to try and maneuver a fire truck around in Jerome? Or, would you like to be the business owner who has to make-do with a building and infrastructure put in place before your grandmother was born?
As for the Jerome fire chief, he really is in a no-win situation. Obviously, if he attempts to enforce the code based on his training and expertise, he is going to get sued. Likewise, if he looks the other way over what he believes to be a life-safety issue and someone is killed in a fire, you can be assured the legal process servers will be on him like a forest fire in July.
What Jerome obviously needs is another layer of oversight. The town needs to establish a fire code appeals board that provides one last look at these conflicts before they are turned over to lawyers and judges. Such a board could include a fire professional from an outside agency, someone who is an expert in the installation of fire protection systems, a building contractor and representatives of the business community. If both sides can agree to live with the decision handed down by such an independent panel, it surely saves everyone the acrimony and expense of the legal process.
