An Act to Provide Fire Protection in Municipalities Having No Paid Fire Department

October 1, 1907

ACT NO. 1733

AN ACT TO PROVIDE FIRE PROTECTION IN MUNICIPALITIES HAVING NO PAID FIRE DEPARTMENT

SECTION 1. In all municipalities having no paid fire department it shall be the duty of all officers and members of the police force to act as firemen, and the police force of each such municipality shall constitute a fire department and be regularly instructed, exercised, and trained in the duties and work of firemen by its officers under the direction and supervision of the municipal president, with such assistance as he may require from the municipal councilors. The entire police force, as such fire department, shall be drilled in its practical duties not less than once in each week or as much oftener as may be necessary to reach and maintain proficiency in its duties and the use of the apparatus furnished for its use. Such departments shall be regularly inspected as to drill, equipment, and efficiency by the provincial governor upon his semi-annual visits to the municipalities.

SECTION 2. Each municipality shall provide equipment and apparatus for protection against fire, which shall at no time consist of less than twenty-four fire buckets, twelve ladders of suitable length, six ropes with hooks attached, of suitable size and length, twenty-four bolos, twelve axes, and one two-man cross-cut saw, and such additional or other apparatus as may be considered necessary by the municipal council and approved by the provincial board. All apparatus shall be kept in such place or places as may be designated by the municipal council, where it shall be conveniently available and shall be kept and maintained in order and constant readiness for instant use. Such apparatus shall not be used except in case of fire or fire drills. Whenever the size or importance of any barrio shall demand fire apparatus similar in kind and amount to that above prescribed, it may be furnished by the municipality and kept in such barrio, as above prescribed. The provincial board may require any municipality to purchase and provide for the maintenance of such additional apparatus as it may deem necessary.

SECTION 3. The municipal council may provide for the enrollment and training of auxiliary volunteer firemen among the able-bodied male residents of the municipality in such numbers as may be deemed expedient, which however, shall not exceed the number of regular police appointed and paid by the municipality. Such volunteers shall, upon joining, obligate themselves to attend fire drills of not less than one hour at least once a week and to report to their officers immediately in case of fire and to obey the lawful orders of such officers at all drills and fires. They shall be divided into subdivisions and attached, by the chief of police, for drill and fire purposes, to the divisions or subdivisions of the police force nearest their respective residences. They shall, while members of such department, be supplied with appropriate metal badges of membership, which shall remain the property of the municipality. Should fire helmets or uniforms be provided for the fire department by the municipality, they shall be supplied therewith for use while in such service, and they may, should they desire, purchase the same for their individual use at cost. They may organize for social purposes and their organization shall be granted the use of public buildings for social purposes at such times and to such extent as may, in the judgment of the municipal council, be consistent with the public interests. The commanding officer of each division or subdivision shall keep a record of the attendance at drills and fires of each volunteer in his command and at the end of each calendar year shall issue to each such volunteer who has attended seventy-five per centum of all drills and fires during the year, a certificate showing such fact that he has drilled at least one hour at each drill attended, and such certificate, when presented to the provincial treasurer, or his deputy in the municipality, shall entitle the person named therein to a refund of the amount paid as cedula or certificate of registration tax for the year covered by said certificate: PROVIDED, That such refunds shall be made wholly from funds of the municipality in which the volunteer service was rendered. Any person who shall falsify any record or issue any false certificate of attendance for the purpose of enabling any person to obtain a refund of the cedula tax, or who shall use or attempt to use any such false record or certificate for such purpose, shall be punished by imprisonment for not less than six months nor more than one year or by a fine of not less than one hundred pesos nor more than two hundred pesos, or both, in the discretion of the court.

SECTION 4. The municipal president and chief of police are hereby authorized to call upon able-bodied citizens to aid in extinguishing any fire within the municipality, and any such citizen so called upon shall be subject to the orders of the municipal president and the chief of police during such fire. Any such citizen who shall refuse to obey the call of the municipal president or chief of police to aid in extinguishing any fire in the municipality, or who shall refuse to obey any lawful order of the municipal president or chief of police during a fire, shall be punished by a fine not to exceed twenty pesos or by imprisonment not to exceed twenty days, or by both such fine and imprisonment, in the discretion of the court.

SECTION 5. The public good requiring the speedy enactment of this bill, the passage of the same is hereby expedited in accordance with section two of "An Act prescribing the order of procedure by the Commission in the enactment of laws," passed September twenty-sixth, nineteen hundred. CAIHTE

SECTION 6. This Act shall take effect on its passage.

ENACTED, October 1, 1907.