Bay Village improves ISO rating

Bay Village firefighters training in ladder rescue techniques. Training is one of the essential categories on which the ISO rating is based.

The Bay Village Fire Department is delighted to announce that, based on its recent analysis of our Fire & Rescue services, we have received the Insurance Services Office (ISO) Class 2 Public Protection Classification (PPC). This places Bay Village in the top 2% of communities nationwide.

ISO is a third party independent agency that evaluates the readiness of all 50,000 fire departments in America every 5 years, and uses that evaluation to provide statistical, actuarial, underwriting, and claims information and analytics to the market. ISO rates each fire department on a national scale from 1 to 10, with a 1 being the highest possible rating.

According to ISO, its Public Protection Classification Program plays an important role in the underwriting process for insurance companies. Most U.S. insurers report that the PPC information is used in their decision-making process when determining what businesses to cover, what types of coverage to offer, and what prices to charge for both residential and commercial property insurance. With each improvement in PPC rating, community members may expect to see a discount on their annual insurance premiums.

The ISO’s PPC program evaluates communities according to a uniform set of criteria. These criteria incorporate nationally recognized standards that have been developed by the National Fire Protection Association, and include three major areas:

  • Emergency communications (reporting, telecommunications, and dispatching systems);
  • Fire department staffing and training; and
  • Water supply (inspection and flow-testing of hydrants, available water supply, and amount of water theoretically needed based on representative structures).

For historical perspective, Bay Village had been assigned a PPC rating of Class 5 for the years 1971 through 2013. In 2014, we improved our PPC rating to a Class 3. And now, beginning in 2020, we move forward as an ISO Class 2 Fire Department.

BVFD Chief Christopher Lyons

Bay Village Fire Chief

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Volume 12, Issue 6, Posted 9:43 AM, 03.17.2020