The Greater Round Lake Fire Protection District serves an area of approximately 16 square miles, protecting and providing services for more than 44,000 residents.The villages of Round Lake, Round Lake Beach, Round Lake Heights, Round Lake Park, Hainesville, and unincorporated areas of Round Lake and Long Lake make up the fire district. The budget for the district for the fiscal year 2007 - 2008 was $6,934,000.00 and the total property value of the fire district was $850,000,000.00. The district also has received funds from various donations and several grants from the Lake County Community Development Block Grant program which we have used to purchase items such as bunker gear, station renovations, communications equipment, and several pieces of fire apparatus.

Mission Statement
To protect our residents, visitors and their property from the adverse effects of fires, medical emergencies and other dangerous life threatening situations through: Public Education, Training, Prevention, Planning, and Community Interaction with safe efficient professional emergency response.

Department Motto
Service Through Dedication

As the 5th busiest fire department in Lake County the district answered 4,263 calls for assistance in the year 2007, and we are anticipating on answering more than 4,400 calls for assistance this year. The district staffs 3 fire stations, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. We are a combination department consisting of full time firefighter/paramedics and part time firefighter/EMT's and paramedics, also known as Paid-On-Call (POC). The district also contracts with Metro Paramedic Services to supplement full time personnel. Currently the department has about sixty members, which includes full time, part time, and contract.

Our members are all trained to the minimum of Illinois Firefighter II and EMT-B. Our sworn full time members are required to be certified paramedics and most also choose to be on the Lake County Special Response Team as Divers, Hazardous Materials Technicians, Confined Space Technicians, Structural Collapse Technicians, or High Angle Technicians. Many of our members have also earned other certifications through the Illinois State Fire Marshal such as Firefighter III, Fire Apparatus Engineer, Fire Officer I & II, and Instructor I, II & III as well as obtaining an Associates, Bachelor's, and/or Master's Degree in Fire Science.

Currently there are 15 personnel assigned to each of the three shifts and due to vacation time the number of personnel on duty is 13. although due to illness or other unforeseen circumstances our manning can drop to as low as 10 personnel per shift. The shifts run from 8:00 AM until 8:00 AM the following day, and the staff is divided between the three stations as such:

Station 1 has 1 Captain, 1 Lieutenant and 4 firefighters
Station 2 has 1 Lieutenant and 5 firefighters
Station 3 has 1 Lieutenant and 2 firefighters

During the day, Station 1 also has (2) two members in the Fire Prevention Bureau and Station 2 has a (1) training captain that works from 8-5 Monday through Friday. During the week, Station 2 staffs 1-2 part time firefighters from 6 PM to 6 AM, and on the weekends from 8 AM to 8 AM the following day. All three stations are staffed as jump companies, which means if there is an ambulance call then typically all the on-duty members respond on the ambulance often leaving no personnel for the other apparatus in that station while the ambulance is out on that call and the same thing occurs if the engine or ladder truck goes out on a call. If all the duty crews are on calls or there is a large incident, a general alarm is paged out and the off duty personnel can respond from home to staff equipment and answer calls.

The district is governed by 3 Trustees and 3 Board of Commissioners that are appointed by the county.

The Board of Trustees
PRESIDENT: Joann Walker TREASURER: Michael Kohlmeyer SECRETARY: Rich Kenyon
TRUSTEE:Thomas Bueller, TRUSTEE: Patrick Anderson

The Board of Commissioners
Murrie Boston-Foy, Trudy Denecke, Dean Raymond

The Trustees hold board meetings at Fire Station 1, located at 409 Nippersink Rd. in Round Lake, on the 2nd Tuesday of the month at 1 PM and are open to the public. The Commissioners meet quarterly or as needed. The Trustees are responsible for all matters concerning the fire district except: hiring, termination, promotion, and discipline of sworn employees. Those matters are handled by the Board of Commissioners.

The department is part of the Lake County Quadrant Numbering System and is dispatched by CenCom with the frequency of 154.400. We are also a member of MABAS division 4. Our number series is the 2600 series and is broken down like this:

2600 - 2619 officers
2620 - 2629 engines
2630 - 2639 aerial ladders
2640 - 2649 ambulances
2650 - 2659 specialty units: squads, boats, foam trailers
2660 - 2669 tenders
2670 - 2679 brush trucks
2680 - 2689 fire prevention bureau
2690 - 2699 staff vehicles

Currently the departments fleet consists of 6 ALS ambulances, 4 engines, 1 tower ladder, 1 squad, 1 brush truck, 2 boats, 1 tender and 11 staff vehicles. We also store the Quad 2 Mass Casualty Trailer, Command 2 Communications Van, Quad 2 ARFF / Foam Tender a Lake County SRT roll off trailer truck and containers and an I.T.T.F communications tractor and trailer