Woodinville, Shoreline, Northshore Fire Depts. Explore Merger

WOODINVILLE, WA — The Shoreline, Woodinville, and Northshore fire departments are studying whether to merge into a single firefighting agency that would cover over 100,000 people living in North King County.

The talks are in early stages, but the commissioners for each department have already met twice this summer. Ahead of planned meetings in August and September, the three districts are crunching numbers to see if combining operations would save money, Shoreline Fire Chief Matt Cowan and Woodinville fire officials say. The districts are also working on a draft organizational chart.

"We want to take the best things we're doing and incorporate that into the new organization," Cowan said.

The three departments already often assist each other on calls. And all three, plus the city of Bothell department, are on the verge of combining training operations. That could be complete by early 2020, Cowan said.

"I can't imagine the timing being better. We all have great support from the community, we're all financially viable," Cowan said. "One of the biggest overreaching factors as well is we all have retirements occurring."

A wave of attrition through retirements, Cowan said, could help make consolidation easier. The new department would only need one fire chief, for example.

There are several options for a merger. The departments could form a regional fire authority (RFA), creating a new municipal corporation with the ability to levy taxes. There are three RFAs in King County: Renton, which covers the entire city east to an unincorporated area near Issaquah; Puget Sound, which serves Covington, Kent, and SeaTac; and Valley Regional, covering Auburn, Pacific, and Algona.

If the three departments form an RFA, citizens in each area may still have elected fire commissioners. The Renton Regional Fire Authority, for example, includes the city of Renton and King County Fire District 25, which serves an unincorporated area east of Renton with about 10,000 residents. King County Fire District 25 maintains its own independent three-member board of commissioners, but those three commissioners also sit on the larger Renton Regional Fire Authority board.

Another option would be for the cities involved — including the Northshore cities of Kenmore and Lake Forest Park — to consolidate fire services into one new agency run through an interlocal agreement. An example of that model is Eastside Fire and Rescue, which provides protection for Sammamish, Issaquah, North Bend, and other communities along I-90.

This isn't the fire push for consolidation in North King County. In 2015, Woodinville, Northshore, and the city of Bothell explored forming and RFA, but decided not to move forward.