The Little Rock Fire Department has received international accreditation, making it the fourth such department in the state to have it, officials announced Thursday.
The Commission of Fire Accreditation International approved the accreditation last month, making Little Rock one of the less than 1 percent of fire departments nationwide to have the recognition.
Fire Chief Gregory Summers, who also announced his impending retirement Thursday, said the accreditation should be good news for city residents.
"It sends them a message of the commitment the Fire Department has," he said.
The accreditation, which cost $8,300, means the city's Fire Department is meeting certain industry standards. The accreditation process takes five years, and the city will have to be reviewed for re-accreditation in another five years.
To remain accredited, the department will have to continuously improve technology and policies to conform to industry best practices. The department must also determine its needs, assess its performance and set guidelines to regularly improve, according to the commission's website. Then the commission will verify what a department has reported and determine whether accreditation is appropriate.
Current department upgrades at the communication center will allow faster dispatch of fire crews, said Thurman "Bo" Hagar, the department's accreditation officer. Beyond that, he said, the department will upgrade technology, policies and procedures over the next five years.
The department joins the Rogers Fire Department, the Searcy Fire Department and the fire team at Little Rock Air Force Base in Jacksonville as accredited fire agencies in Arkansas.
Little Rock is the 238th department in the nation to be accredited by the commission, and the 55th to be accredited and have the highest possible Insurance Service Office rating -- A1. The insurance rating is a measure of a department's responsiveness and is used to determine residential homeowners' insurance rates.
"This is all something we should be proud of," City Manager Bruce Moore told a crowd of city employees Thursday morning at the Fire Department's Central Fire Station on Chester Street.
The department's motto is "serving with pride, excellence and national recognition," Summers noted. But people have struggled with that last part for some time, he said.
"Were we nationally recognized? No, we were not," he said.
That's changed, Summers said.
Metro on 08/04/2017