Given the chance to buy or lease a used ladder truck for the Fire Department, the selectmen opted to lease the truck for a dollar a month for the next three months. At the end of that time, they may decide to buy the truck, if it is still available.
The 40-year-old firetruck has seen service in New York City and New Hampshire. Its owner, the repair service Fleetmasters, is offering it for sale but meanwhile needed a place to store it. Fire Chief Rick Sicard agreed to garage it for Fleetmasters, the company that currently maintains the Harvard Fire Department’s other engines.
The same night the truck arrived for storage, a chimney fire broke out in a Harvard house. With the truck owner’s permission, Sicard sent the ladder engine out on the call.
“The advantage of a ladder truck is not just height,” Sicard said. “It’s the reach.” Two firefighters could extend its ladders over the 8-foot snowbanks around the house to get onto the roof and put out the fire. Without the truck, setting up ladders in deep snow would have been time-consuming and exhausting.
Sicard told the selectmen that a new ladder truck costs between $800,000 and $1 million. The asking price for this used truck is $18,000, with about $4,500 in repair and certification costs. Moreover, Rollstone Bank has offered to donate $5,000, which could be used for the purchase, as could money from the Rantoul Trust. Despite its advanced age, Sicard told the selectmen, the truck seems to be in excellent shape, partly because it was built to New York City’s standards, which are higher than most.
A capital question?
Selectmen Ken Swanton and Ron Ricci objected that Sicard had not presented the idea of buying the truck to the Capital Planning and Investment Committee (CPIC), on which Swanton serves, before bringing it to the selectmen. Although its asking price is under the CPIC’s $20,000 threshold, the other costs raise the cost above that amount.
Selectwoman Lucy Wallace proposed leasing the truck for three months with an agreement to buy it if it passed a thorough inspection and all its certification requirements. She noted that Fleetmasters might find another buyer if Harvard did not plainly express its intent. But that proposal was clearly headed toward a 2–2 tie, with only Wallace and Chairman Stu Sklar in support. (Selectman Leo Blair was absent.) So the board finally agreed to a three-month lease, during which time Sicard will check over the vehicle, have it certified, and present the idea to the capital committee.
