CLARKSVILLE, IN (February, 7, 2024) – The Clarksville Fire Department is known for providing fast and professional service to Clarksville residents, but did you know not all residents fall in the department’s fire protection district? Hundreds of residences in northern Clarksville actually fall under the protection of Tri-Township Fire & Rescue. The area borders Sellersburg and was annexed by the Town of Clarksville more than a decade ago. It includes large neighborhoods such as Plum Run, Plum Lake, Deer Run, and Dovir Woods.
During Tuesday night’s Town Council meeting, Tri-Township Fire Chief Amir Mousavi gave a presentation on the history of the department as well as an update on the department’s growth. He was introduced by Clarksville Fire Marshal Brent Wilson, who also serves on the Tri-Township Fire Board as a representative of the Town of Clarksville.
This area in north Clarksville was served by a private fire department known as Sellersburg Fire Department, LLC up until 2019. Due to the growth of the area, it was decided that a government run department was needed to meet the needs of the community, so that challenge fell to Tri-Township Fire & Rescue. Since 2019, Tri-Township has been working to transition to a full service fire department with provisions of EMS and non-transport paramedic service.
“We trained all of our people to become advanced EMTs,” said Chief Mousavi. “We began this planning process 4 years ago when I took over as Chief, so it’s been been a long process.”
According to Chief Mousavi, his department always responds to medical calls with at least one advanced EMT, and most of the time a paramedic. He says up until January, his fire department was the only one south of Columbus, Indiana to offer that advanced level of medical care with medics.
Chief Mousavi told the Town Council that Tri-Township is in year one of a seven year plan to grow the department. Currently the department employs 12 full-time staff members with four ‘on the clock’ at any given time. The staff is supplemented with two part-time staff for each shift. They are planning to add an additional 10 full-time staff members and possibly more in the future. The goal is to have 10-12 staff members ‘on the clock’ at any given time by 2026. That would mean the department would have grown to the same size as the Clarksville Fire Department.
By 2030, Chief Mousavi expects Tri-Township to have grown even larger than Clarksville’s department with four to six fire stations. Currently Tri-Township is responsible for covering 64 square miles including Carr, Silver Creek, and Union Townships, as well as the Clark County Airport.
Although Chief Mousavi has a plan for major growth over the next seven years, he says his department’s priority in the short-term is improving medical care in the area. Something Clarksville and surrounding areas are all struggling to improve.
“As we know emergency medical service is a struggle for every community. Everybody is having the same issues, and creativity in finding solutions is the way to go. The traditional ways don’t work anymore.”
To that end, Chief Mousavi says his department recently purchased two used ambulances and plans to order a third in the near future. Currently it is a violation for fire departments to transport patients to the hospital which forces them to wait for the ambulance services to show up to a scene. Mousavi says that could be as long as an hour in some cases. That’s why he and other local fire departments, including Clarksville, are working with the County Commissioners to create a new ordinance that would allow fire departments to transport patients when needed.
“We are scaling that up to make sure that when we respond to anywhere in our district, if there is a delay in ambulance response, we are not going to wait. We are going to transport our patient.”
Mousavi told the Town Council that he will continue to work with Clarksville Fire Chief Brandon Skaggs to improve their partnership, as well as partnerships with other community organizations, in hopes of improving medical care for everyone in north Clarksville and the rest of the Tri-Township Fire District.
ABOUT TRI-TOWNSHIP FIRE & RESCUE:
The Tri-Township Fire Protection District is a governmental entity that was created in 1987 by the Clark County Commissioners of Indiana to ensure that adequate funding was provided for fire protection and related services within this special taxing district. The District includes the geographic area of Silver Creek, Carr and Union Townships which includes the Town of Sellersburg, portions of the Town of Clarksville, and Memphis Indiana. Prior to September of 2019 the District provided fire protection contractually through a third party private company. In 2019 the District Board decided to form its own governmental fire department to provide services to the citizens of this District. Since September of 2019 the district operates its own paid, full time professional fire department. The department operates with staff working the traditional fire service schedule of 24 hours on duty and 48 hours off duty. In 2020 the department responded to over 2600 calls which included emergency and nonemergency responses to fires, motor vehicle crashes, rescues and emergency medical requests. Visit their website at https://www.ttfpd.org/ or find them on Facebook.