Is Carefree safer today than it was before Cave Creek joined Automatic Aid? The answer has to be no!
When the Rural Metro station was in Cave Creek that station responded to a number of calls in Carefree, particularly on the west side of our community. With that division of work the response times for Rural Metro in Carefree were averaging 3 minutes and 15 seconds. Since Cave Creek joined Automatic Aid and stopped responding to calls in Carefree, the response times for the Carefree station have jumped to 4 minutes and 22 seconds.
If the voters in Carefree vote yes in the upcoming special election, we will be able to join Automatic Aid and the Cave Creek station will once again respond to calls in Carefree. The likely outcome being a reduction in response times for all Carefree residents.
In addition to having the Cave Creek fire and emergency medical response available to Carefree residents, THREE other stations in our immediate vicinity (one from Phoenix and two from Scottsdale) will also be available to respond to emergency calls in Carefree. It’s really pretty simple – having FIVE fire and emergency medical response stations available to assist when necessary has got to make us safer than just having the one Carefree station.
This simple equation is not a knock on the Rural Metro firefighters – it is simply recognizing the fact that times have changed with the loss of our mutual aid partners. In order to make our community safer, everyone should vote YES in the upcoming election.
Peter Burns
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