East Point’s hydrant failure could affect insurance rates

The state’s insurance and safety fire commissioner says his office will question East Point officials this week about why several fire hydrants failed in their town Sunday as firefighters fought a blaze in an apartment building on Phillips Street.

Commissioner John W. Oxendine said if his office discovers the city has a history of hydrants failing, he will ask the Insurance Services Office to revisit East Point’s fire protection rating, which could cause homeowner insurance rates to rise.

The ISO rates more than 45,000 communities nationwide on firefighting operations, equipment, dispatching and water supplies. Insurers use the ISO’s ratings to set property insurance rates.

The scores are on a scale of 1 to 10. The lower the number, the better. East Point, for example, has a 4 rating now, compared to 2 for Atlanta and Alpharetta, according to Oxendine’s office.

“It’s very problematic,” Oxendine said in an interview about Sunday’s incident in East Point.

“If it is like a one-time fluke event, it is probably not going to have an effect. If this is a systemic problem, then it is going to affect their ISO rating. And that is one thing my office is going to make some inquiries about: Is this a systemic problem?”

East Point City Councilwoman Earnestine Pittman suggested in an interview today that the city has a bigger problem on its hands. And she confirmed city officials have known about low water pressure in some of its hydrants for months. City officials, she said, gave the council a presentation about the problem perhaps as far back as May.

“We are aware that we have water pressure issues with our fire hydrants and we also have a plan to address that,” Pittman said. “And that is part of our capital improvement plan. We know that we have fire hydrants in some parts of the city that have low water pressure.”

City officials did not immediately respond today to a request for public records, including the city’s ISO rating reports and fire hydrant inspection and maintenance records. An ISO spokeswoman said today that the rating organization was reviewing the incident in East Point and could not immediately comment on it.

Witnesses to the fire on Phillips Street in East Point — located southwest of Atlanta in Fulton County — say firefighters were unable to draw water from five nearby hydrants. The residents said they helped fire crews carry hoses until they found a hydrant that worked, two blocks away, at the corner of Semmes Street and Center Avenue.

One resident estimated the working hydrant was a quarter-mile away. Others who helped out confirmed the distance, noting they were carrying fire hoses past non-working hydrants.

Fortunately, neighbors said, the eight-unit building was vacant when the fire started around 6 p.m. It was still burning but contained at 8 p.m. No injuries were reported. The reason for the malfunctioning hydrants and the cause of the blaze were not known.

Sunday’s incident came days after an Atlanta Journal-Constitution analysis revealed that during the first six months of 2008, only 38 percent of East Point’s calls met the national response standard of six minutes. That was before the city, in a budget move, laid off 48 firefighters and closed two of its five stations.