HELEN - Helen has a new fire chief and staff, with plans to add more.
Former Hall County and White County firefighter Jody Prickett began work Thursday as the city's full-time fire chief.
Prickett replaces Capt. Lee Poteat, who led the department for a couple of years, City Manager Jerry Elkins confirmed.
Following closed session at the end its meeting Tuesday afternoon, the Helen City Commission voted to amend the fire department budget by $60,000 plus associated taxes, uniforms and other expenses to place a firefighter in the station 24 hours a day.
The city also will hire a second full-time firefighter to work with Prickett.
The vote was to cover the city with 4,160 hours per year through the two full-time personnel, and about 4,600 hours of part-time staffing, said Commissioner Jeff Ash, who made Tuesday's motion.
That will provide one firefighter on duty at Helen Fire Department around the clock.
Prickett is a native of the north Hall area and served for 13 years with Hall County Fire Services and for one year with White County Fire Services.
"My chief in White County pushed for me to get up here," Prickett said. "I'm happy about it. I look forward to all the challenges. Hopefully I can turn it around."
Prickett said he is thankful a second full-time firefighter will be coming aboard, but is complimentary of the part-time firefighters the department has hired.
"I've got three great guys right now, but the problem is when they're at their other jobs they work 24 hours," Prickett said. "I know the weekends are going to be hard to cover, but it's going to help a lot having these part-time guys in."
Ash was pleased with Tuesday afternoon's meeting.
"I think today was a good day to introduce Jody as our new fire chief," Ash said. "But more importantly, we made budget adjustments for the next year to include additional funding to make sure that we have firefighters covering this town 24/7 365 days a year. That's the most important thing."
Ash said talks are ongoing between Helen and White County about possible consolidation of fire services.
"We received a great deal of help from [Public Safety Director] David Murphy and Chief [Norman] Alexander with White County, and I think that, in and of itself, had been one of the best for Helen, too, in this cooperativeness as well as this expansion of expenditures to give Helen the best fire protection possible," Ash said.
"We have a fire up here and it mangled or disfigured any part of the town, it could drastically affect the tourism and the shop owners, and we can't afford to have that," Ash sai. "I'm particularly happy that our building inspector is now becoming a fire marshal. I think that's where you start nipping problems in the head is having him go out here and look at these buildings before we have to walk in 'em with a hose."
Asked whether Station 8 remains a city-run department, Ash said, "Helen Fire Department is under the auspices of the city manager of the City of Helen. Jerry [Elkins] is working closely with David and the White County chief and as we proceed along we'll see more and more intertwining relationships and agreements, but right now we've taken care of a big problem - and that's fire protection."
Elkins said the city hopes to add additional volunteer firefighters as well.
