The De Soto Rural Fire Protection District has taken over management of the De Soto Fire Department after both the City Council and De Soto Rural board unanimously approved resolutions this month.
During the Feb. 16 City Council meeting, City Manager Todd Melkus took nearly 10 minutes of the hour-long meeting to explain the agreement to the crowd of more than 50 people gathered in the council chambers. He said De Soto Rural board approved its resolution on Feb. 11.
Melkus said the contract is a one-year management contract that could be canceled by either party after 60 days if the partnership isn’t working. He has clarified it is not a merger, but rather an agreement for the district to provide “operational management, training, incident response management and executive leadership for the city fire department.”
The city will pay the fire district $90,000, which was about the same amount the city paid for former Fire Chief Tony Ochoa’s salary and benefit package before he stepped down on Jan. 30.
“I commend the City Council, as well as the De Soto Rural board, on their open-mindedness of how we can move forward with this project,” Melkus said. “Our goal is to provide the best service to every resident, whether it’s city of De Soto, whether it’s De Soto Rural district.”
Earlier in the meeting, during public comments, Dean Kohler asked for clarification about the proposed agreement he found out about from reading City Councilman Todd Mahn’s personal Facebook post on Feb. 1, which Mahn said would be “saving the city thousands of dollars while allowing us to hire and retain the most qualified personnel.”
Kohler asked for specifics on the agreement including how it would keep the city from needing to buy a new fire truck and if the Rural employees would be driving city fire trucks.
“I just want to know the answers,” he said. “People need to know the answers. This decision doesn’t just affect my house, it affects the entire community.”
Melkus said city employees are still city employees.
“The city fire trucks are still the city fire trucks,” he said. “The De Soto Rural employees are still the Rural employees. Their apparatuses are the same. There’s not any purchases or any changes in equipment. It’s just that we are contracting with their management to oversee our day-to-day operations. There’s no tax increase. Nothing’s changing when it comes to … if you live in the rural district, you’re still paying the same rural real estate taxes you’ve been paying for the last 75 years. And for the city, you’re still paying the same sales tax and the real estate tax you pay for the city. Nothing’s changing in that aspect.”
He said De Soto and De Soto Rural firefighters already were working together on most calls.
“When you guys see a call in De Soto or the surrounding areas, you’re going to see a yellow truck; you’re going to see a red truck. And guess what, they are working together …I would think when you guys see somebody show up to an emergency on your property, you just want to see them operating fluidly, professionally and to the best of their ability. You could care less if they have a De Soto fire patch on or a De Soto Rural patch on.”
Melkus said he knows some will bring up that 75 years ago the two departments had a “big blow up” and they split.
“We’re long past that,” he said. “We’re looking at moving forward. I know our council was excited about Chief Fitzgerald, his 20 years of leadership as an assistant chief, as a chief. You can’t just go out and hire that.”
Melkus asked residents to give the contract a chance.
“My only thing is … let us give this a chance because we’re just trying to make this better for everybody,” he said. “And if it works out, great … If it doesn’t work out, then I guess you can come back to us and say, ‘We told you so.’ But, at this time, we feel this is our best route forward.”
During City Council comments, Mahn addressed Kohler’s earlier comments saying his own ideas of what they may do with the fire department in the future may differ from the rest of the council. He has said he sees this contract as a first step. He said he may have a town hall meeting in the future to discuss those ideas.
The De Soto Fire Department, which covers 6.4 square miles within city limits, employs seven full-time firefighters and five part-time firefighters when fully staffed and responded to about 1,000 calls, including mutual aid responses, in 2025.
De Soto Rural, which covers 174 square miles in unincorporated portions of the county, has 17 full-time and nine part-time firefighters, as well as 16 volunteer firefighters. The district has six stations in its district. Fitzgerald said the district responded to more than 1,700 calls, including mutual aid responses, in 2025.