Firefighters were again picketing outside City Hall this evening, after starting their efforts this morning. The firefighters are pressuring the council to form a Regional Fire Authority form of government to run the department, rather than having it be run by the city.

Union president Jason Tucker said the firefighters have been trying to get the city and District 12 to compromise. But after a recent City Council retreat, they heard the leaders were leaning toward a city-run department.

“That’s not the right decision for this community,” Tucker said. “A lot of us were born and raised here. No one supports a city department.”

The reason is when a city runs a fire department, money comes from the general fund. Firefighting sometimes loses when competing for dollars.

“Everybody wants out of that,” Tucker said of other cities. “No one wants to revert back.”

Under an RFA, the governing board is more autonomous, and funding more stable. The city’s own consultant said so two years ago.

Two weeks ago, a number of firefighters attended a council meeting to show support for an RFA. Talks have been going on for two years on whether to keep the fire department a district, or change to an RFA or city-run department.

Firefighters placed yellow signs up all over town over the weekend, supporting an RFA. They have encouraged residents on their Facebook site to call the mayor and council members to show support for an RFA.

A key to the length of the negotiations is the city wants a majority on the governing board because the city pays the majority of the costs. Fire commissioners want representation to remain more equal.

Tucker said the firefighters haven’t just pressured the city. They also pressured the district to settle when the city wanted a 4-1 advantage on the governing board.

The fire commissioners balked at that idea.

“No smaller entity wants to be controlled,” Tucker said.

He added that the city shouldn’t have demanded that big of a majority. He said Kent, Renton and Auburn all fairly recently changed to RFAs with equal representation.

One recent idea adding to the debate happened at a council retreat last week in Bremerton. The city decided it wants to look into a possible RFA with the city of Arlington.

Tucker said that upset firefighters, who were asking since talks began to look into Arlington, Lake Stevens or any other consolidation that made sense.

“But some on the council were emphatic” not to do that, he said.

Mayor Jon Nehring said the city is leaning toward an RFA, but it wants the “best RFA.”

“We want the best deal for the taxpayers and to look at every option,” Nehring said. “Why would we want to shortchange the city of Marysville?”

Because of an approaching deadline, Nehring said the council could decide for the city to run its own department until an RFA could be formed, with Arlington or maybe even others.

Tucker would not be in favor of that. Instead, he thinks the system should stay as it is until the city decides which RFA would be best.

“That would be the responsible thing to do,” he said.

City Councilman Michael Stevens, who is on the fire board, doesn’t think the city should operate a fire department in the interim either. He said things suddenly are moving too fast.

“An RFA with Arlington has not even been analyzed yet,” he said.

Stevens said the entire situation is a mess.

“We thought District 12 would be a slam dunk” to combine with, he said, adding they have had a joint district since 1992. Instead, there was the battle over representation and other holdups.

“Sometimes government takes too long,” Stevens said. “But I’m worried we’re getting rushed.”

Nehring said firefighters are worried about lowered funding. But he said that is not going to happen, no matter what future government oversees the fire department. The City Council has made that commitment.

Stevens said the firefighters are picketing under a worse-case scenario. But he agreed a city-run department would limit the growth of a fire department. It may cost less initially, but there would be problems later on, he added.

The council will have a special meeting about an RFA Aug. 3.

“We eagerly await the vote,” Fire Chief Martin McFalls said, adding the department wants to be able to plan for the future.