Editor’s note: A name in this story has been corrected from the print version. The board member quoted is Bill Freeman, not Bill Lloyd; Lloyd is not a part of this department. 

PIKES PEAK — They have trucks, they have training, and by now, their protective gear should have arrived.

“We’ve got enough firefighters to roll on a house fire tonight,” said Brad Lovins, the chief of Brown County’s newest volunteer fire department.

Southern Brown Volunteer Fire Department plans to start responding to fire, medical and other emergencies on Oct. 15.

Its primary response area will be south of State Road 46 in and around Van Buren Township, but firefighters and emergency medical responders will be available to assist other departments when they are called upon to do so, said fire board Treasurer Bill Freeman.

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This brings the number of all-volunteer departments operating in Brown County to seven. Two of them are in Van Buren Township.

The groundwork to establish Southern Brown — “SoBro” for short — started mid-summer. That was around the time the Van Buren Township trustee and advisory board ended a three-year-long legal battle with Van Buren Township Volunteer Fire Department over contract and management issues.

“Of course, we have plans to interact with all the fire departments, but right now things are a little contentious, so we’re going to tread lightly,” Freeman said.

“We just want to provide the best fire protection we can for the residents of this township.”

To help build rapport, Southern Brown firefighters are having a free hog roast Saturday, Oct. 14 at Harmony Baptist Church, at Mt. Liberty Road and Bellsville Pike.

They also plan to begin meeting and training this month at Van Buren Elementary School, and anyone is welcome to attend.

Lovins said he understands there’s a long story behind firefighting in Van Buren Township, but he wants this new department to be about something positive — helping their neighbors — and not about the past.

“These guys are telling me that there’s a need, and I’m here to help the need,” said Lovins, a former chief for six years of Southwest Bartholomew Volunteer Fire Department in Bartholomew County.

Ten of the 18 Southern Brown volunteers carry a total of 83 certifications, volunteer Terry Miller said. Two are professional firefighters in other counties.

Seven are former Van Buren volunteer firefighters — including a past chief and one of the founders of that department in the 1970s.

All are residents of Van Buren Township, as are the board members, Van Buren Township Advisory Board member Ben Phillips said.

This fire department was structured so that all township residents can have a voice in the way the fire board does its business, and all residents — renters and property owners — have a vote, he said.

“A lot of community people have gotten involved,” Phillips said. “They’ve seen what’s been happening with the lawsuit and they wanted to step up for fire protection.”

Van Buren Township Trustee Vicki Payne said she’s been amazed at how the department has come together.

A fire department in Bright, Indiana, near the southeastern corner of the state, sold them a 1994 engine for $35,000. That purchase came out of the township’s cumulative fire fund, which comes from township taxpayers.

An engine in that shape could have gone for about $75,000, firefighters said.

The Bright firefighters also kicked in a load of equipment they no longer needed, such as breathing apparatus, a generator and a winch, Payne said.

A three-quarter-ton pickup truck was donated for the fire department’s use, and the township purchased a “skid pack” — a compact way to pump and/or carry water to a fire — to sit in the back.

The new department’s fire board has signed a contract with the Van Buren trustee and advisory board that allows access to about $100,000 of taxpayer money for equipment, and $20,000 a year to pay its bills.

What Southern Brown doesn’t have right now is a station, as the Van Buren Volunteer Fire Department owns the one across from the elementary school, and plans to continue running out of it as long as it can keep the doors open.

Van Buren Fire has been running on donations for three years while the contract dispute played out, and with its contract severed, it has no guaranteed funding stream.

For now, Southern Brown is using the trustee’s office and home on Bellsville Pike — about a mile from the Van Buren station — as a home base, and board member Ben Miller — on 135 South near the Jackson County line — has offered space to store the trucks, Phillips said.

When an emergency happens, trucks will be coming from Miller’s place near Spurgeon’s Corner, Phillips said.

Gazing over the trucks, and small groups of volunteers still standing around talking after a day of training, Payne was smiling.

“I know they have a wish list, but this is so much better than I ever thought it could be,” she said.

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When Southern Brown Volunteer Fire Department starts responding to calls in Van Buren Township on Oct. 15, who’s going to be called to that emergency: Southern Brown, or the Van Buren Volunteer Fire Department?

It’s likely going to be Southern Brown, Sheriff Scott Southerland said.

Southerland said that after talking with the county attorney, who talked with another attorney with the state 911 commission, “it was their opinion we dispatch the contracted department.”

He said the sheriff’s department was waiting on information from Southern Brown that would allow it to be built into the computer-aided dispatch system. He hadn’t been told when Southern Brown’s start date would be.

Van Buren Township Advisory Board member Ben Phillips said to his knowledge, no ordinance had been passed at the township level that would limit only Southern Brown to be called to any emergency in the township. That concern had been brought up at the September meeting of the Van Buren Volunteer Fire Department.

If more than one department would be needed at an emergency in Van Buren Township, it’s also unclear who would be called next to assist the primary responder.

“There are a lot of things that need to be considered: Who has mutual aid agreements with who? I can’t say if any other department would want to be dispatched without a written agreement,” Southerland said.

“It is my opinion that a meeting with people from the new department, along with (Dispatch Supervisor) Brenda (Wojdyla) and I, would need to take place to iron out these issues.”

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WHAT: Southern Brown Volunteer Fire Department meet-and-greet and free hog roast

WHEN: 4 to 7 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 14

WHERE: Harmony Baptist Church, Bellsville Pike and Mt. Liberty Road

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