Denton County adopts fire plan, accomodating unincorporated developments

By Abigail Allen

Editor & Publisher

Denton County is planning a new approach to fire protection in the unincorporated areas of the county.

The plan pulls from other examples but is not an exact copy of any approach in Texas.

"There is no county that has implemented the three tiers we're proposing to implement, which is a combination of contracting emergency response zones to the jurisdictions who are closest, the county contracting with these MUD districts and subcontracting out to the closest unit, or, in some cases, actually staffing and having a county fire department serve other areas," said Sheldon Gilbert, the senior management analyst.

The county relied on the help of Gilbert, who is also the president of Denton County Emergency Services District No. 1 and No. 2, to develop the plan starting in April.

The county cited a law in Local Government Code Chapter 352 Section 019B, which states, "The county fire marshal shall coordinate the work of the various fire-fighting and fire prevention units in the county. On request, the county fire marshal may assist a rural fire prevention district or emergency services district located wholly or partially in the county to accomplish its powers and duties."

The three-tiered plan, which allows for all three tiers to be implemented independently as well as simultaneously, would change the planning process and placement of fire stations in undeveloped and unincorporated areas of Denton County.

The Tier 1 portion of the plan, which is set to begin in October 2025, focuses on response and reimbursement methodology.

At that time, the county plans to switch from fire districts to emergency response zones.

Also in Tier 1 is an increase of funding for unincorporated portions of the county that are not within special taxing districts, such as a Municipal Utility District or a Public Improvement District, with the funding portion from the county being re-evaluated annually.

It would also cut funding for unincorporated developments that do have a taxing entity.

"The legacy contracts, kind of on the east side of the county there, tend to be lower based on the fact that county money was being paid for responses into there," Gilbert said. "On the west side of the county, where you have the newer MUDs going in, the entities who are providing services are contracting for the correct amount, and therefore not depending on that subsidy."

Aubrey and Providence Village have been in contract negotiations that turned into legal action regarding their contracts with some of those taxing entities for months.

That two-year cut to funding would dramatically change the Aubrey Fire Department budget.

"If they carry out their plan and they reduce it to 20% funding, we would lose $1 million in the first two years, which is a lot," Aubrey Fire Department Chief Eric Schlotter said.

Although Pilot Point does not have any unincorporated developments with one of those funding mechanisms, that could develop in the future.

"We're fortunate right now that we don't have any MUDs that we cover," Pilot Point Fire Department Chief Heath Hudson said. "Our city council and city development services and city manager have done a great job in working with developers, doing development agreements and bringing them into a PID or a TIRZ and not doing a MUD."

The ability to contract with a developer for fire services is one of the tools cities still possess to encourage annexation.

Annexation laws have changed since 2017, removing powers the cities had historically.

County Judge Andy Eads said the Commissioners Court was concerned with fire coverage if a developer refuses to annex into a city.

"I've been in office 17 years, and I really always had an expectation that the cities would slowly annex into the unincorporated part of the county, and then there would be very little unincorporated part of the county in the future once the county was built out," he said. "… With this new change a couple of years ago, we realized that there's going to be large sections of the county [that is unincorporated]."

That percentage is around 50.4%, or 481 square miles, which will become the Denton County Emergency Response area.

"We don’t see a lot of that changing," Eads said. "… We want to make sure we have efficient services, adequate services, and then have those spaced out in a thoughtful manner that really doesn't look at political jurisdictions, but it really looks at where the service area needs to be."

High-density developments can be confusing to new residents who believe they are moving into a city, Eads added.

"The marketplace has changed," Eads said. "When people moved to the unincorporated part of the county, there was an expectation in the past that they realized there [were] low taxes … and along with that, with those minimal government resources, … there may be a longer response time, because you're not receiving full municipal services.

"With the urbanization and the smaller lot sizes, people are moving to more urbanized developments in the unincorporated part of the county. That's new."

In Tier 2, the model would allow the county to contract with the special taxing districts for fire and EMS services, as well as subcontracting "with appropriate jurisdiction," according to the presentation.

In Tier 3, the presentation specifies that the funding for the county's fire services would be "funded by special taxing districts (MUD's) and current Tier 1 County Fire and EMS payment funding."

Both Tier 2 and 3 would include the county owning, operating and equipping its own stations, with the plan within Tier 3 to allow for "transferring assets and services areas" based on future annexation agreements.

Although the original plan showed multiple county stations within Pilot Point's jurisdiction, Hudson said, that portion of the plan was amended after the county talked to Pilot Point about its own future plans.

The primary goal, the county officials said, is to have the initial response be based on who is closest, as opposed to whose territory an event occurs in.

None of the 10 affected chiefs were consulted about the details of the plan nor were they given more than mention of the county's fire and EMS services master plan in advance of the plan being approved, Gilbert said.

"We had to put a plan together that we could address with the court and get approved by the court before we could be submitting to the fire chiefs," Fire Marshall Brad Sebastian said.

Schlotter and Hudson questioned that reasoning.

"Overall, I just felt like we were blindsided on the deal and there was no participation by any of the fire chiefs in Denton County of knowing what was going on, but yet they took the time to discuss it within the county, the County Commissioners, some MUD district attorneys and developers. They left the fire chiefs out and the cities."

Schlotter also said the county consulted with developers about the plan before contacting the chiefs.

"Why would you talk to them and not to fire chiefs if you couldn't talk to anybody until it was a thing?" he said.

As of Aug. 22, Eads, Sebastian and Gilbert had spoken to each of the departments.

County officials including Eads said it was born out of concerns regarding response times and the proximity of some stations to others in different jurisdictions after a man died of a heart attack waiting for EMS response, prompting this "innovative approach," he said.

"This action taken by the court and by the staff really is a response to a tragedy and asking ourselves how can we do things better," Eads said. "That man's death will not be in vain because we all committed to do things better."