Waltham council approved a 40 per cent increase in fire department spending at its Jan. 28 special budget meeting, despite two councillors’ arguments that council has not adequately looked at saving costs.
The budget for fire protection services will increase from $121,555 last year to $173,298 – an amount that includes costs for additional training and a new communications project the municipality is exploring.
Council set aside an amount of $16,200 for 18 new radios, which are part of a new project intended to improve communication reliability across the territory. The radios are meant to replace the pagers that are issued to each firefighter, and would use the new cellular tower on L’Isle-aux-Allumettes if a rental agreement can be arranged.
An additional amount of $40,000 is being budgeted to help pay for this project, which is in its early stages and must go through several council votes before proceeding. The amount, if it is needed, would be financed through a fee to residents.
The municipality confirmed in an email that the communications project is still under discussion, and that no decisions have been finalized at the council level. The email said the fee is a “proactive measure to ensure that funding will be available if the project moves forward.”
The budget also sets aside $24,000 in firefighter training and course fees for the upcoming year, up from $5,000 last year. Waltham has set aside money for six Firefighter 1 training courses, although only two applicants are confirmed at the moment. Their course fees will be covered if the applicants graduate from the course.
While councillors Chantal Fortin, Francis Turner, Elwood Allard and Tyler Rochon voted to adopt the new budget, councillors Holli Lair and Brendan Adam voted against it and gave statements opposing the budget’s adoption.
Adam and Lair said at December’s council meeting they felt the municipality could save money by teaming up with Pontiac Ouest’s fire department, which currently services Chichester, Sheenboro and L’Isle-aux-Allumettes. A grant is available from the province that could see participating projects receive $350,000 or more for a shared services project.
In the budget sheet Adam distributed at that meeting from Pontiac Ouest’s 2025-26 year, Chichester (population 350) and Sheenboro (pop. 149) each paid $72,075 in fire protection services. Waltham’s (pop. 387) budget for this year is $173,298, more than twice that amount.
Adam said that given the potential savings he was frustrated the council did not at least explore the option of teaming up with Pontiac Ouest.
“I think it’s inappropriate of a council to make decisions on the amount of money we spend without looking into other options, whether we would have went with them or not,” he said at the budget meeting, adding that the council would not have needed to commit to an agreement.
Lair agreed. She said after the meeting that she is hesitant to commit so much money into a department that has had trouble recruiting new members, and currently relies on several firefighters who reside in other municipalities.
“We’re struggling to have a bountiful amount of volunteers. I think it might have been more digestible to invest this kind of money if we had better success with a large volunteer force,” she said.
THE EQUITY has made several attempts to speak with Waltham mayor Jordan Evans to better understand her council’s budget, but she has not responded to THE EQUITY’s repeated requests for comment.
Evans was present at last week’s budget and regular council meetings, but did not chair either because she said she was sick. At the end of the budget meeting, Evans removed herself from the council table, walked to the back of the room and observed the rest of the meeting from the back row of the audience. Pro-mayor Elwood Allard led the meeting in her place.
Larry Perry, who will remain Waltham’s fire chief until a successor is announced, defended the budget. He said his department often budgets more than it ends up spending, and likely will not spend the entire $173,298.
“Almost always we have greater budget provision than we actually spend. We never meet those numbers, we never spend it all,” he said.
He said the communications project is essential because it is an upgrade from the current pager system that firefighters use. He said firefighters currently get paged via their personal pager but cannot respond until they get to the fire hall, making communication with 9-1-1 difficult.
“Our handheld radios [ . . . ] we need to have them be able to talk to a tower that talks to 9-1-1 from any location within the territory,” he said.
Perry said he felt that Waltham’s cost increase mirrored that of other municipalities, as the crunch of increased equipment costs is being felt everywhere.
At the regular monthly meeting, council also approved the creation of a hiring committee to meet with fire chief applicant Michelle Vanasse. She is the only applicant so far, but council had not officially interviewed Vanasse for the position. Lair suggested a committee be struck instead of Vanasse being hired on the spot at the council meeting.
“There should be some sort of HR process to formally interview her. I don’t think it’s right to just sit here in a room full of people and say, ‘Hey, do you want this?’,” Lair said.
The committee met with Vanasse on Friday, but the municipality said there is no information to share about the meeting at this time. A future special meeting of council will be held to appoint the new fire chief.
Correction: The print version of this story stated that Waltham had six new applicants to the fire department, when in fact there are only two. The $24,000 the municipality set aside in its budget for Firefighter 1 training merely reflects the possibility of having six applicants.
