2024 Spring Recap

Good day and Happy spring to All,

As members of your volunteer fire department, the Board of Directors and I

would like to wish each and every one of you a safe and healthy year!

I would like to take a moment to talk about our biggest project taken on as

a department which will provide some safety against a wildfire: the completion of

the BonFire grant. This was an incredible project that gives us protection against

fires encroaching the bay. Both property owners Doug & Claudia Peters and Jim &

Bernie Miller deserve a lot of thanks. Although the Fire Department received the

grant, their permission was required to conduct the project within their property

boundaries. Their commitment to keeping the brush under control going forward

is a priority for them and should be a priority to all of us. Take time this year to

walk the perimeter and see what a great job was done.

Last summer the department completed the 900 plus feet of hose extension through George and Marce Hollinger’s property, up the draw to a dry standpipe built near the meadow intersection. Earlier this spring the department replaced the fire hose with 4” irrigation pipe! This allows us a greater volume of water and the ability to extend the water curtain and fill trucks more quickly.

Last fall the department acquired two (2) serviceable water reservoir tanks.

This will allow the strike team in Pine Cove to have an available water source right

on site. They will be available for you to look at this spring when the roads are

passable.

Your VFD board is looking at priorities for the future:

• We are continuing to look for grant monies to build a structure to keep our trucks, equipment, and inventory safe and out of the weather.

• The inflow pipe for the beach pump needs to be extended. Currently as the water level goes down the pipe is exposed and no longer useful. Remember that Firestorm in the early 1990’s was mid-October? If that was to happen again, we may have been out of water and “Out of Luck”, so we will be extending the pipe!! With the flood gate issues going on at Albeni Falls dam we will be temporarily extending the pipe so we can assure water flow for the summer months also.

Here are some other projects the Board will be working on:

• Adding an additional large pump near the Kilroy Creek area. This will give us options for greater water flow for that end of the beach and allow us to move the smaller pump to another area.

• Additional standpipes and water tanks in strategic areas with irrigation pipe.

I hope you can visualize the good things that are happening and could be

happening “firewise” for the Kilroy/ Pine Cove communities, but we still need

your help in protecting it. After much discussion the Board feels it is necessary to

ask for a $200.00 donation or whatever you can spare this year. The department

would always welcome new volunteers to help prepare for the upcoming fire

season. You and your donations, whether time, money, or hopefully both, are the

“backbone” to our success in achieving the goals of making Kilroy Bay and Pine

Cove as safe as we can. Become involved!

If you choose to donate, please make checks payable to KB & PC VFD and mail to:

KB & PC VFD

c/o Nancy Kvamme

1750 N Harvest Pkwy

Liberty Lake, WA

We will be having our annual Memorial Weekend meeting Saturday May 25, at

11 AM in Miller’s meadow. I hope to see many of you there.

Tim Martin

Volunteer Fire Chief