Swift Current City Council passed a motion Monday night to amended an agreement between the City's Fire Department and the R.M. of Swift Current's Fire Department.

Effective October 31, the Swift Current Fire Department will no longer respond to motor vehicle collisions (MVCs) that occur in the R.M. of Swift Current.

"I don't think it will be a cost savings overall (for them)," Fire Chief with the Swift Current Fire Department Denis Pilon said. "There reasoning (for the amendment) was more on the line of trying to maintain their volunteer fire fighters. It's about more work and different types of work besides just fighting a few grass fires every year. They wanted to get them a little more interested so more of a retention issue."

Since the 2017 budget for the R.M. of Swift Current was announced, the fire department has been able to purchase vehicle extrication tools more commonly known as the Jaws of Life.

Also included in the purchase of the extrication tools was the required training in order to provide the service.

"We will continue to do technical rescue, so things like water rescue, high-angle rescue, and those types of things," Pilon said. "We do have a mutual aid agreement with them so we can jointly respond to assist them if there is a major event and quite often they will have a big fire where they need a water supply, so we will bring our tanker out and support them. We will continue to do those types of things."

The new agreement still allows for mutual aid response between the two departments when deemed necessary by their fire chiefs and is effective from October 1, 2017, and expires December 31, 2019.

The Swift Current Fire Department still has six other vehicle rescue agreements in place with surrounding communities and R.M.s.