Dear Editor, On November 3, during the General Election, the Northern Arizona Consolidated Fire District #1 (NACFD1) will be holding an election to fill three seats on its board. Richard Veradt, Gerald Lucero and Susan Brown are challenging three incumbents, Jim Bailey, Mike Collins and Erik Berg for their seats. Each of us has attended many meetings of the board for many years and are unhappy with how our fire district is being managed.

We have spoken out at public meetings, requested assistance, and yet are still not seeing improvements. On Sept. 23, Jim Bailey released a statement on behalf of the City of Kingman Fire Chief Jake Rhoades, who manages the fire district through a management agreement. According to Bailey, everything is great. Response times have been reduced, service is improved, but the public needs to know the facts. Now, the fire district board has restricted public comments, something that we have been able to do for years. Using the COVID-19 card, we have been blocked from attending public meetings and most recently, our comments are no longer read into the record.

Yet Jim Bailey has full use of the local newspapers to spread his version of the story, while we are unable to comment in any forum. Since when is this permitted in our great country? This is our take on this situation. In a public meeting on Sept. 30, Jim Bailey called us a bunch of “clowns”. He again attacked us on Oct. 4 in the The Standard. It seems Jim is upset that we are challenging him, along with Mike Collins and Erik Berg.

We refuse to get in the mud and resort to the childish name calling and finger pointing that Jim is so fond of. We are adult voters, and are unhappy with how Directors Bailey/Collins/Berg along with Director John Bryant and Kingman Fire Chief Jake Rhoades are managing the fire district. It is our constitutional right to challenge an elected official, and run for an elected position when we believe there is a problem. Jim has attacked people who we know, and accused us of being friends with “bad” people.

We followed the case closely involving Victor Riccardi, Sue Wilkin, and Wayne Eder, not out of friendship, but out of concern for people in our community who we have known for years. Some of us were actually present during Eder’s “sentencing” when Judge Rick Lambert basically wiped Chief Eder’s slate clean and ruled that he could return to work as a fire chief. He also ruled that Jim Bailey, Mike Collins and former Chief Pat Moore, all of whom had testified against Eder, had themselves been involved in a similar “conflict of interest” and should themselves be charged.

Yet when one of us tried to file that complaint, Mohave County Deputy Attorney James Schoppman refused to do his job. The good old boy network in action. The City of Kingman has tried to take over the fire district for many years. Jim Bailey is a retired Kingman Firefighter. Mike Collins is a former Kingman Firefighter. Erik Berg has family ties to the City of Kingman and works as a supervisor for AMR/River Medical Ambulance which provides ambulance service to both the city and district. Another board member, not up for reelection John Bryant, lives with the City of Kingman FD dispatch manager.

Taxpayers and voters in the district have publicly commented time and again that these relationships give Kingman an unfair advantage and potential conflict of interest which has been documented and fallen on deaf ears. Reduced response times only apply to a few stations. We are not against working with the City of Kingman Fire Department. We do believe however that our taxpayers should come first. We are the ones paying, yet not receiving services.

It is about time that this district serves our taxpayers and listens when people bring concerns to the fire board. Fire stations are closed with no service provided to taxpayers in Chloride, Truxton, Valentine/Hackberry, Antares Road (Valle Vista area). At the fire station on Stockton Hill Road north of the cattle guard, Fire Station 33 is open 9-15 days per month according to Rhoades. This leaves taxpayers in Lake Juniper, Cedar Ridge, Fountain Hills and along Cactus Wren without service for up to 21 days per month.

The district’s fleet of fire engines are constantly breaking down due to excessive use and no replacement program. In 2017, the three of us supported the purchase of two new water tenders, one funded with grant money while Bailey and Collins fought the purchase. One fire engine, purchased by the residents of Valle Vista before the merger in 2007 has been taken away from the closed fire station on Antares Rd. and is routinely used as a replacement for the broken down fire engines in Butler.

We have nothing against serving the Butler area, we just ask for equal service in all communities. Our district used to have a highly effective volunteer firefighter program. A program which is a shadow of its former self. We understand that you need four firefighters before attacking an interior structure fire. Valle Vista currently has two on duty, with no volunteers. Our firefighters have to wait until engines from town arrive before they can enter a burning building. What if someone is trapped?

What if those engines are busy on other calls? The hay barn at 2600 Northern Ave. purchased in 2012 for $500,000 recently received approval by the incumbents for a $1.2 million facelift. Though we have asked to see the complete paperwork on that 2012 purchase, nobody has presented it and the seller refuses to discuss the purchase. Why? Their justification for the facelift was that the current fire station (#31) on Northern is “unsafe”.

A recent inspection by Mohave County found that the building (Station 31) was not unsafe. How can they justify that type of expenditure with five closed stations and an aging apparatus fleet constantly out of service and no plan to replace these old fire engines. The engine from Northern Station 31 is one of the busiest fire engines in Mohave County according to statistics, yet was purchased new in 2004. At 16 years old, it has outlived its useful service life as a frontline engine.

Residents in Valle Vista suffer from reduced services and delayed responses. There have been two structure fires in the last year where the Valle Vista fire engine actually showed up late, or after the engine from the Northern Avenue station showed up after a 20-minute response! Think about that. One Valle Vista resident suffered a heart condition and was refused service by Kingman dispatch, who sent an ambulance from Kingman while the Valle Vista fire engine sat in its station.

The family even called the fire station directly and were refused service. Recently, a Valle Vista resident with a large laceration went to the fire station to request assistance and to control the bleeding. They were refused service and told to go to the hospital. What type of fire department are you running? Equal service for all? Hardly. Valle Vista fire station used to respond to snake calls to protect the public from venomous snakes. This service has been eliminated.

Kingman fire believes that it is dangerous for firefighters to provide this service. Fighting fires isn’t dangerous? Currently our fire district is paying Kingman $155,550.00 for management of the Fire District. We could hire a full-time Fire Chief for much less but Baily, Berg and Collins, again showing their deference to Kingman, voted for this waste of district residents taxpayer dollars going to Kingman. Bailey and Kingman Fire Chief Rhodes have bragged that response times were reduced by two minutes.

Does this include responses from the closed fire stations? And the list goes on and on! Our plan includes: Provide quality service to all of our taxpayers, residents, and visitors. Reopening the closed fire stations on Stockton Hill Rd.; in Truxton, Chloride, Valle Vista (Antares Rd.) and Valentine. Developing an effective volunteer firefighter program to serve both rural communities and the Butler area. Develop a fire engine replacement program using grants and other funding to update our unsafe aging fleet of fire engines.

Improve emergency medical services response to those in need of medical assistance. Be fiscally responsible with the finite funds that we have. As raising the fire tax is not an option, we want to explore other funding sources to improve our district. We want to restore integrity to our fire board and stop the attacks on our citizens by this out of control board. It is difficult for us to comprehend Jim Bailey’s self-endorsement in The Standard on Oct. 14.

Why did you list your name only and not your running mates? It also seems a bit confusing when you raised such a concern that we were potentially using the NACFD1 logo to make it appear that the district was endorsing us, while you used your position and title to endorse yourself and running mates. You have been publicly accused of violating constitutional and civil rights of our taxpayers and citizens, yet you continue to attack those that do not agree with you.

You, along with Collins, Berg, Bryant and Rhoades have done a terrible job of managing our fire district. We will not stoop to your level. We would like to thank our many supporters, including current and former NACFD1 firefighters, and former firefighters from the pre-merger fire districts of Hualapai Valley, Valle Vista, Chloride and Truxton. We love our firefighters and believe they deserve to be responding in safe vehicles with adequate volunteer backup.

We thank the many businesses and private citizens who have willingly allowed us to put up signs and banners on their property. Thank you to all who have assisted us in our fundraising efforts, we greatly appreciate the confidence you have in us. We love our community and look forward to your vote on November 3. Please remember in November who have not been looking out for your tax-payer dollars and those who will when elected to the Board!

Richard Veradt

Jerry Lucero

Susan Brown