The Centennial Fire District is now officially part of SBM. On January 21st there was a celebration at station number 3 in Blaine to welcome Centennial to SBM, which now serves five cities – Spring Lake Park, Blaine, Mounds View, Centerville and Circle Pines.
There was a strong turnout of firefighters and other people from the community at the event – including local leaders such as Centerville Mayor Nancy Golden and Circle Pines Mayor Matt Percy.
SBM is thrilled to be teaming up with Centennial.
“It’s a big night for us,” said SBM Fire Chief Dan Retka. “This is something that’s been in the works for probably a decade now. As the fire service continues to change, pressures continue to mount for our fire departments around the region here. Collaboration needs to be happening for us to survive as fire departments. The cost of doing business has gone way up. SBM started this back in 1944 working with several cities.”
“I think all communities win,” said Matthew Montain who has been with Centennial but is joining SBM. “From SBM they get a group of amazing firefighters. Firefighters that are ready to serve their community and just want to be a part of it. The cities of Centerville and Circle Pines now have 24-7-365 coverage and not only are they getting the crews that were there but they’re also getting everybody that was with SBM. They went from 20 people to 82 responding firefighters over night.”
“Hiccups inevitable”
The integration of these fire departments should definitely benefit every city in the SBM area. Of course change is never easy but Retka believes they can overcome any hiccups in this transition and thrive in the future.
“Absolutely,” Retka said. “Anytime you have big change like this, inevitably you’re gonna have hiccups. That’s one of the things that were prepared for. We’re constantly readjusting and making sure that we’re able to fix things on the fly. The beauty of it is our staff did a great job. We’ve had the last four years of planning for this.”
“There’s always hiccups and transitions, but yes I think we’ve worked out those kinks,” Montain said. “The bumps that we may see are going to be small. Frankly everybody from the SBM and Centennial side have worked hard to get to this point. There’s been a lot of long nights, a lot of things we’re worked out, but we reached the finish line and we have a great group.”
