Ohio U student fire fee igniting conversation amongst students, school administration and city officials

On Wednesday, April 26 of the last academic year, Ohio University’s Student Senate passed a bill that would allow for the adoption of a student fire fee. The bill has been the subject of controversy since its inception in October 2022 and has been the culmination of eight years of lobbying for increased funding by Athens Fire Department (AFD) Chief Robert Rymer. 

When the student fire fee bill was initially proposed, students raised the question: why does the AFD need additional funding? The answer lay in how fire departments are funded from a public policy perspective. AFD, and other fire departments, receive funding from property and income tax. However, Ohio U property accounts for 29% of the city of Athens, while also accounting for, on average, 40% of emergency calls that AFD responds to. Being a public university, Ohio U  is non-taxable. Therefore, a total of 36.4% of properties in the city of Athens, and 50.6% of all commercial property is tax-exempt. Given the disproportionately high poverty rate in Athens County, income tax does not make up for the revenue lost in the property tax area. AFD is not receiving sufficient funding from the current socio-economic structures in place to fund them.  

Due to the disproportionate number of university-related incidents, coupled with the lost property tax revenue, Ohio U has a financial agreement with AFD to compensate for these losses. The current financial support that AFD receives from Ohio U is the result of a memorandum of understanding (MOU) that started in 2012, offering $50,000 per year for five years. The university’s new president, Dr. Lori Stewart Gonzalez, will decide whether or not to continue the agreement. She also has the opportunity to alter it, allocating more or less money to AFD. This MOU is the entirety of the financial aid offered by the university to AFD and is used for “apparatuses,” not for maintaining staff. An example provided by Rymer in an interview was the previous purchase of a new fire truck, which cost $1.2 million. Therefore, the amount paid by the university does not provide necessary funding for even “apparatuses,” much less the wages and benefits of a firefighter. 

When city administration approached Ohio U about additional funding, Ohio U was unable to provide any more support without raising tuition. This is how the bill became a Student Senate issue, because the university claimed to want to hear whether the students were in favor of additional charges. Rymer also approached the state legislature, who similarly deflected, stating that tuition was high enough, but “if the students want it, we’ll support it.”

John Detherage, the fire chief of the Oxford Fire Department (OFD), is in a similar predicament. Miami University, another public university, is located in the college town of Oxford, Ohio. OFD similarly received inadequate funding from property tax. OFD currently staffs five people per shift and answered 3,200 fire and EMS calls last year. According to Detherage, other departments in Butler County with a similar run volume are staffing at least 15 people per shift. With only 10 people on their full-time staff, Detherage reiterated that the funding OFD receives is not sufficient to fulfill the proper duties of a fire department. 

When questioned about Miami University’s contribution, Detherage said, “Since 1996, Miami has contributed one-third of the cost for fire trucks and ambulances from a handshake agreement. They provide no other funding and nothing for operations. We approached the vice president of finance a few months ago about financial assistance and were denied. Our City Manager has been directed by Council to submit a formal written request to the President and Board of Trustees for funding. I’m hopeful they will step up, but realistically, I doubt it will happen. Our only hope is that they will consider some type of student fee.”

The idea of the student fire fee was born following years of research, according to Rymer. For his Executive Fire Officer program, Rymer composed a research paper on alternative funding for fire departments. Some possibilities included charging a fee for official fire safety inspections, but AFD does not currently have the financial freedom to hire an inspector. Another possibility would be a “Sin Tax,” a tax on alcohol and tobacco products, which has historically been effective for counties seeking funding for public infrastructure. However, the notion of a “Sin Tax” has since been struck down by the Ohio Revised Code. Sales tax revenue goes to the county, rather than the city. In his research, Rymer talked to fire chiefs at Bowling Green, Kent, and Oxford, Ohio, all college towns housing state universities, and all facing the same issue of inadequate funding. A student fire fee existed as a plausible solution that no other department had yet attempted.

While providing additional and much-needed funding to AFD, the student fire fee would also contribute to fire safety training for university students. According to a survey conducted by Student Senate Governmental Affairs Commissioner Dan Gordillo, who proposed the fire fee bill, 50% of students who responded to the survey received no formalized fire safety training prior to their time at Ohio U. Many students do not know how to use a fire extinguisher, and many instances in which the fire alarms are triggered in the dorms are false alarms. This is dangerous, Rymer discussed, because AFD only has enough manpower to respond to one emergency at a time.

Photo Provided By Dan Gordillo

Additionally, Rymer discussed the dilemma that many firefighters face in such situations. Due to the large number of false alarms, especially in the middle of the night, many students stay inside and disregard the evacuation warnings. The firefighters are consequentially caught in a difficult situation because identifying and extinguishing the fire should be their first priority to prevent the fire from getting out of hand. They do not have the time or manpower to search the dorms and rescue students in the case of a genuine emergency, especially when many students have grown accustomed to ignoring the fire alarms.

Rymer expressed the desire to partner with the university’s Resident Advisers or Learning Communities to instruct fire safety. According to Rymer, such a partnership would require more personnel and curriculum planning, adding to the current workload. The fire fee would contribute to funding this endeavor, teaching university students fire safety and how to operate their dorm microwaves without burning their food, possibly minimizing the number of false alarms. Education is a powerful weapon to prevent crises before they begin. 

“This isn’t just money to the fire department. This is about receiving education,” Gordillo said. “Ohio University is a place of education, people should know what to do when a fire breaks out.”

The student fire fee, if implemented, would exist as an opt-out fee, similar to the student legal fee. An argument made repeatedly by former Student Senate President Dayna Shoulders is that $50 a semester may be “the straw that breaks the camel’s back” for students struggling financially. However, Gordillo, the student senator presenting the bill, argued that students for whom $50 determines whether or not they can afford tuition, would not neglect to opt out. 

Ohio U student Aiden Fox attended the senate meeting to speak out against the bill. Fox called the fire fee “a Band-Aid solution being paid by the wrong people.” Fox cited Ohio U’s previous annual budget of $4.9 million allotted to OUPD and argued that the university should therefore be able to find the money to fund the fire department adequately. 

“It’s the responsibility of OU and the city,” Fox said, arguing that the burden should not fall onto the students.

Other arguments opposing the bill came from Student Senator Rees Morris and Student Senate Vice President Isaac Davis, who suggested that the bill be opt-in, rather than opt-out. However, the data from the survey shows a staggering majority of students in favor of an opt-out fee, although the survey did not discuss the possibility of the fee being opt-in.

After an initial proposal to the senate, the bill did not pass. However, Rymer expressed hope for the future following this verdict, stating that in eight years, this was the closest they had gotten. They had written a bill, and it had made it to the senate floor. The fire fee proponents re-grouped, sought feedback on how to improve the bill and Gordillo sent out a survey to gauge the student body’s thoughts on the matter. The report concluded that out of over 600 responses, the majority supported the fee, and an overwhelming majority supported the option of paying a fee. 

At the final General Body Meeting of the 2022-2023 academic year, Student Senate voted to pass the bill, which succeeded with only one vote in opposition and five abstentions. Ultimately, the decision about whether to alter students’ tuition and fees falls on Ohio U administration, so whether or not the fee will be instated remains to be seen. As of fall 2023, no fire fee has been added to students’ tuition.

When approached for comment at the conclusion of the final senate meeting, Gordillo said, “The fight is not over. We still need to go directly to OU admin and bring this up. This is a monumental step, and I look forward to bringing this to OU admin so we can finally, once and for all, help the fire department.