The Finance Committee met on December 1, 2025, from 5:50 PM to approximately 7:30 PM in the Lakewood City Hall Auditorium to continue budget hearings for the proposed 2026 comprehensive budget. The committee received presentations from the Fire Department, Lakewood Municipal Court, and Police Department, and discussed council-initiated budget amendments and contracting authority. No final votes were taken on the budget ordinances.
Fire Department Budget (Chief Fairbanks)
Lakewood Municipal Court Budget (Judge Neff & Court Administrator Maria Russo)
Council-Initiated Budget Amendments & Contracting Authority
Police Department Budget (Chief Fischer)
Okay, everybody, let's convene the finance committee meeting at 5 50 p.m. As a first order of business, I'd like to consider the proposed or the draft minutes from the November 24, 2025 finance committee meeting. Is there a motion to approve? So moved. Second. Second. Motion has been made and seconded any discussion. Hearing none, all in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed and the ayes have it. Thank you. So we've got uh uh 10 or 15 minute section on council initiated budget amendments. I'd like to reserve that for um finest director to be present. Why don't we? If it's all right, uh Chief Fairbanks, are you prepared to begin talking about the fire department budget? Yes, that's the motto. Council president says fire is always prepared. Uh okay. Um thank you for being here. Thank you for the presentation. We've got a presentation, council members in our in our electronic dockets. Uh perhaps we can project that on screen when we get the equipment turned on. But uh direct uh uh chief, please feel free to proceed. Okay, good evening, everyone. Uh just a quick overview. I'll start uh the first two slides are just uh informational. Um course our new watercraft is in that first slide. They performed a drill uh with the county. This was part of the uh mass casualty drill that involved the good time three, so they had about uh fifty fifty wounded and involved all the police agencies that utilize water craft as well. So we are really the only paramedic trained or paramedic certified um water asset in our region. So they definitely wanted us to partake in that in that exercise. Um just a quick department description, a little history lesson. We've been in existence since 1910. We have the three fire stations located strategically across the city. Um we operate three fire suppression companies, three advanced life support paramedic units. And um uh an incident command vehicle at station one and a fire prevention unit at station one. We also have several support vehicles, including our new rescue boat and several reserve apparatus. Uh maintaining a healthy reserve fleet ensures our capability to maintain a continuity of operations that limits the downtime of our units and also results in a seamless service to our residents. Here's our organizational chart. Um we comprise of 93 individuals committed to working as a team, protecting our citizens and their property. Uh we have three shifts of personnel that work 24 hours, seven days a week, 365 a year. Our fire prevention bureau is comprised of our fire marshal, the two fire inspectors, and Oliver, our neighborhood paramedic. In 2025, we administered a civil service exam in June, which resulted in a certified list of 41 eligible candidates. We also hired a lateral candidate for the first time in since 2016. Our recruiting strategies are going to start to take a more hands-on approach in the future. Uh Captain Flores is going to be putting together a team of current firefighters to improve our visibility in our target communities. Uh, one thing that we are finding is the applicant pool is shrinking, and all of the regional fire departments are fighting for the same applicants. So it's uh almost a strike strike early, strike often type of approach. And we when we find an excellent candidate, we want to go out and get them and get them in a Lakewood fire department uniform. We also administered a promotional exam over the last year for the position of assistant chief as Mick Tanasebich is going to be retiring after 32 years of service to the city of Lakewood.