In 1995, Westminster became the first city in California to go out to bid for fire service. The city concluded a hard-fought contest to replace its in-house fire department by selecting as its new fire service provider the Orange County Fire Authority, which beat second-place finisher Rural/Metro. Four cities and a startup firm, ACR Technologies, also submitted proposals.

Westminster’s former city fire fighters had bitterly protested the city’s decision to contract out the service. They attempted to recall the four (out of five) council members who favored the idea, but the recall effort failed. The council members argued that economics in fire protection were essential in order for Westminster to afford increased police protection—and the voters agreed.

Both the winning Orange County bid and the second-place Rural/Metro bid proposed saving Westminster taxpayers some $11 million over the five-year contract term, with the county bid offering about $500,000 more in savings.

Since 1948, fire protection in this Phoenix suburb has been provided by a private, for-profit company, Rural/Metro. Before the city incorporated in 1952, Rural/Metro offered subscription service to individual homes and businesses (as it still does in rural and unincorporated suburbs elsewhere in Arizona). Upon incorporation, the city and Rural/Metro negotiated a service contract, which has been renewed periodically ever since.

Besides offering high quality, the company has figured out how to produce this labor-intensive service at lower cost. The key is to use a mix of full-time firefighters and on-call paid reservists (most of whom are city employees who receive regular monthly training and have permission to leave their city jobs when their pagers alert them to a structure-fire call). Using its innovative combination of full-time and part-time firefighters, Rural/Metro averages 23 firefighters on every Scottsdale fire call. A half-dozen outside studies over the years have verified the cost-effectiveness of Rural/Metro’s approach.

Eighty-eight firefighters are employed full-time in Scottsdale; 70 others are employed part-time. All are trained at levels consistent with the standards set by both the Arizona State Fire Marshall’s Office and the National Fire Protection Association. The company agrees to provide a "minimum of 240 hours of training each year of service to all full-time firefighters ... and a minimum of 72 hours of training per year [or eight hours per month] for all reserves and Fire Support fire fighters." Moreover, all full-time firefighters must hold the "Firefighter II level of certification, State Emergency Medical Technician certification, and EMT-D certification when working in the primary service area."

The agreement worked out between the City of Scottsdale and Rural/Metro Corporation is the most comprehensive and demanding fire privatization agreement that exists. It includes, for example, provisions specifying response time requirements, response-time definition, response-time liabilities, response-time penalties, and — because sometimes special circumstances arise — exception report logs.

The thorough and precise nature of the agreement is intended to ensure that Scottsdale taxpayers get their money’s worth from Rural/Metro. The contract is valued at more than $5 million and a strict system of accountability is built into the agreement. There are nearly a dozen different monthly reports that "must be completed and submitted to the City’s Contract administrator within 15 days after the end of each month." Among the various reports required of Rural/Metro:

• Total number of incidents responded to in the city;
• Fire cause analysis report of structure fires;
• Report of monthly fire prevention activities; and
• Report of estimated water usage for training, fire suppression activities, and fire prevention.

In addition to providing fire and emergency medical services, Rural/Metro also enforces the city fire code, and ensures that new construction is in compliance with city fire ordinances. Before the owner of a new building can be granted a Certificate of Occupancy by the city, the building must first be inspected thoroughly by Rural/Metro. All new fire protection systems, including hydrants, sprinkler systems, alarm systems, halon systems, etc., are examined and tested by the firm.

University City Science Center, which conducted an in-depth, five-month study of the firm concluded that Rural/Metro’s "model prevention and inspection program provides citizens with a higher degree of safety than that which is available in most communities .... It has one of the lowest structure fire rates and fire dollar loss rates in the valley. At the same time the costs for services are low compared to other communities."