Officials from SeaTac, Burien, Tukwila, Normandy Park, King County and the Port of Seattle gathered Nov. 14 at SeaTac City Hall for a presentation on cooperative fire services, including a possible merger of departments.

Retired Fire Chief Bob Merritt from Emergency Services Consulting Inc. said options range from more cooperation between departments through consolidating some functions to complete integration of departments.

Des Moines and Federal Way as well as Auburn and Pacific recently merged their fire departments.

SeaTac Mayor Gene Fisher said Auburn's merger saved that city almost $10 million-enough to hire 15 new police officers.

Fisher arranged the presentation following the narrow rejection by voters on Sept. 19 of a SeaTac property tax hike to pay for the replacement of two fire stations and the hiring of more firefighters.

"We gave the citizens a best-case scenario, mostly derived from a pre-9/11 approach, with no options," Fisher said.

"It makes no difference if the vote failed by 40 or 4,000, the citizens sent us a message that we need to rethink our fire services and I agree."

He said there are three fire stations in three different jurisdictions within 2.4 miles of each other on the north end of SeaTac.

Tukwila has better access to his city's north end via South 144th Street than does SeaTac's fire department, according to Fisher.

With increased demand for fire services and shrinking income, Merritt said there are several reasons for closer cooperation.

The consultant cited tax limitations, rising labor costs, unfunded government mandates, large capital costs, high costs of doing business and additional special operations units.

Merging would maximize resources by locating fire stations where needed instead of by city boundaries and would lessen public perception of too much governmental duplication, Merritt noted.

He said departments could form a regional fire protection service authority to govern a consolidation or merger. It would be similar to Sound Transit, which manages a regional approach to mass transit.

Such an authority would consist of three elected officials from each department, who would prepare a proposal with funding options for voters to approve.

"The keys to success are getting all stakeholders involved and focusing on serving the citizens," Merritt declared.

SeaTac resident Linda Snider, who supported the SeaTac tax increase, said, "This is a step backward. The only thing driving this is finances."

Joe Dixon, a SeaTac resident who opposed the tax, countered, ""It would be criminal if we don't proceed."

SeaTac Deputy Mayor Ralph Shape noted, "I am a skeptic, but I'll keep an open mind."

Although SeaTac Councilman Chris Wythe expressed reservations about creating another tax authority, he added, "I am in favor of moving forward if there is interest from other jurisdictions."

SeaTac Councilman Don DeHan said he is not convinced but "it is a good idea to take a look at whether regional is the way to go."