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the project for our area and will be the financing agent. The County is favoring the digital type of program, which would allow all county emergency personnel to talk to each other. The new system will operate with amazingly clear reception and very good distance operation. We do not know what our cost will be. At this time, the DNR does not know if they will participate in this program. These new frequency radios will cost about three times what our present radios cost. Fire personnel helped with the Safety Town program again this year, completed all our required hose testing for 2009, Tasha Carlson was appointed to the State Fire Training board by Governor Pawlenty, Roger Varilek resigned from the department due to job requirements, all fire fighters passed fit testing and medical requirements for 2009, David Knutson has been on a year long leave of absence and has not yet returned to active fire status, another very successful pancake breakfast was held with record attendance of over 1250 people, and the fire department sponsored Ron Myers memorial scholarship was awarded to Cody Larson of Nisswa who will be attending welding classes at Central Lakes College. A question was asked if the number of fire fighters is adequate now. Thirty is the optimal amount and even if David Knutson does not return to the department, we will not need to add additional fire fighters. Another question was asked regarding pancake breakfast money funds. The department operates a general fund checking account through the Pequot Lakes Firemen's Relief Association. The funds in this account pay for general expenses of the department such as purchasing pop, water, food for extended training sessions, miscellaneous office and maintenance expenses, and anything else where payments need to be made inn short order. This account is audited every year along with the retirement fund account. A lengthy discussion was held regarding the departments thoughts of discontinuing billing for general fire calls to contracted areas. The billing process takes a lot of time to obtain information and mailing addresses. Several insurance companies are requiring detailed bills with justification of why we are billing for a particular call. We also feel that people are afraid to call the department for an emergency because they do not want to get a bill. A good example of this is when a carbon monoxide detector or smoke detector goes off for no apparent reason. Sometimes there is a real problem and nothing gets done to solve the problem. The department does not want to deter helping people because they are unable to pay a bill; safety is our purpose. If bills were discontinued, the general fire fund would have to absorb the loss of revenue. Bills would continue for grass fires, brush fires, and motor vehicle incidents. Comments included McNerney thought not billing may lead to a lot of nuisance fire calls, Ryan mentioned an idea of not billing for the first hour of a call. A discussion followed concerning the idea discussed at our last meeting about using all fire calls instead of just structure fire calls to compute the cost of fire contracts. Dubay and Benson thought smaller townships contract rates would increase at an alarming rate,