Apex Volunteer Fire Rescue has achieved a fire insurance grading, which may enable property and business owners to qualify for improved insurance rates.
A Dwelling Protection Grade 3A has been achieved for Personal Lines insurance and a Public Fire Protection Classification 7 for Commercial Lines.
“Achieving a fire insurance grading of ‘protected’ is a significant milestone that recognizes the hard work of our dedicated volunteers and supportive community members to provide 24/7 fire protection services,” Fire Chief Kelly Johnston said in a press release.
“This not only increases the public safety of the Apex community, but ensures peace of mind and economic viability for residents, businesses, and property owners through increased insurance affordability.”
According to Fire Underwriters Survey, a service for insurers and municipalities, “in past reviews, the staffing of the fire department was a primary item within the fire department review, (which) resulted in fire insurance grading recognition not being granted.”
There are now 16 trained members, including the fire chief, living and working in the community.
“The underlying data of this report has been developed for fire insurance grading and classification purposes,” Johnston said.
The mission of Apex Volunteer Fire Rescue is to provide the residents and visitors of the Apex Mountain Resort community with safe, efficient, and effective fire and public safety risk reduction and emergency response services.
Since becoming an Regional District Okanagan Similkameen fire service in Jan. 2022, members of AVFR have made substantial progress in staffing, training, and operational readiness. To date, AVFR has established a staffing strength of 16 trained volunteers and four new recruits.
Over the past year, volunteers have been training to become proficient in exterior and interior attack structural firefighting, vehicle extrication, medical first responder, rope rescue, wildland fire suppression, wildfire structure protection, and fire prevention.
AVFR team members have also spent time improving fire apparatus and equipment operational readiness to industry standards. This work will help prepare the team to provide frontline response during emergencies.
AVFR senior leadership has been working with the RDOS and Apex Mountain Resort staff to provide a new base of operations and home to fire apparatus by winter 2024.
AVFR is also working through the process of ordering a fire engine to replace the current Engine 121, also known as Timber, as the frontline engine. Delivery of the new fire engine is expected by mid-2024.
The 2022 Keremeos Creek wildfire presented the first significant test for AVFR members and the community of Apex, since the new fire service was established.
With the help of other fire agencies from across the province, and substantial home-grown community support, AVFR was up to the challenge. AVFR looks forward to continually improving the service they provide to the community and the resulting increase in safety and peace of mind that it brings.
Special to The Herald
