Public Safety

The Public Safety area covers the Fire Department, Police Department, Ambulance Service and Building Inspection. The city has direct provision of police and fire services and contracts for ambulance services and building inspection. The city provides fire services to four surrounding townships by contract.
The activities of the Fire Department include:
- fire suppression
- fire prevention programs
- open burning control and rescue
- auto extraction
- first responder
- training
- communications
- fire station maintenance
- equipment maintenance
- code compliance
- investigations
The Police Department performs policing activities including:
- patrol
- investigations
- traffic accidents
- first responder
- school liaison
- community engagement
- training
Both engage in mutual aid.
Analysis
Lake Mills is the median in comparison to the other cities for police services and the costs appear to be lower in the larger cities on a per capita basis. We provide police coverage twenty-four hours, seven days a week. This is may not be the case for all the cities in this comparison.

Data from "MunicipalFacts" by Wisconsin Taxpayers Alliance

Police Expenses Per Capita
Year 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002
Municipality

Columbus $158.87 $167.20 $178.40 $201.86 $262.07
Edgerton $162.41 $170.12 $164.47 $172.00 $181.72
Lake Mills $136.31 $147.92 $151.76 $156.61 $157.70
Milton $113.51 $137.43 $129.07 $129.50 $129.35
Mount Horeb $103.61 $109.60 $115.31 $129.03 $145.86

Research indicates that basic activities such as police patrol, where there are no economies of scale, are most efficiently performed by small departments. However, specialized activities such as communications, homicide investigation, major crime laboratories, and training are most efficiently performed by organizations serving a large population. Small departments that do not have specialized activities available from larger organizations are not efficient and large departments often perform police patrol at higher cost than small departments.
The City contracts or has access to many of the specialized activities with other larger organizations to achieve the most efficient economies of scale available to a city of our size.