{"id":34421,"date":"2026-02-25T10:15:11","date_gmt":"2026-02-25T15:15:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/?p=34421"},"modified":"2026-02-25T10:15:13","modified_gmt":"2026-02-25T15:15:13","slug":"all-township-fire-protection-fees-paid","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/2026\/02\/25\/all-township-fire-protection-fees-paid\/","title":{"rendered":"All township fire protection fees paid"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By BOB SHRALUKA<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

WZBD.com<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The four townships who receive their fire protection from the Decatur Fire Department are now paid-in-full with the department for 2026.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Root Township paid $38,117.43 while St. Mary’s paid $18,543.48. Union’s bill came to $16,488.09. All contracts were approved by Decatur’s board of works and safety at its latest meeting..<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Washington Township earlier paid its bill of $29,875.60.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

For the first time since the 1970s, the City of Decatur increased its fees for fire protection.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Up until this year, what the four townships had been paying amounted to 6% of the fire department’s annual budget. And, it was pointed out, 25% of the city’s fire (and some medical) runs were being made to those townships.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So an increase of 3% (6% to 9%) was agreed upon by city officials, with the department’s budget for this year set at $1,144,659.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That will bring an additional $103,019.31 to city coffers this year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The cost of fire protection to the four townships was divided proportionately according to their net assessed valuation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The total net assessed valuation for the four amounted to $488,034,545:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Root, $181,823,566.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Washington, $142,243,566.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

St. Mary’s, $86,333,173.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Union, $77,634,240.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As of July 1, 2023, here are estimated population numbers for the following townships:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Washington, 8,777.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Root, 6,118.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

St. Mary’s, 1,278.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Union, 910.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By BOB SHRALUKA WZBD.com The four townships who receive their fire protection from the Decatur Fire Department are<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":34422,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[14,15,21],"class_list":["post-34421","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-decatur","tag-featured","tag-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wzbd.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Decatur-firefighter.jpg?fit=926%2C924&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34421","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34421"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34421\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":34423,"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34421\/revisions\/34423"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/34422"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34421"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34421"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34421"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}