The Mississippi Ratings Bureau has lowered the Culkin Fire Protection District’s public protection classification from an eight to a six.

“To have a full volunteer [department] with a rating like that is something to be proud of,” Warren County Fire Service Coordinator Jerry Briggs said.

Fire districts are rated from 10 to one, with 10 being a low rating, which indicates  a high insurance policy for its constituents and one being a high rating, indicating a low insurance policy.

“What that does is gives your insurance companies something to base your premium off of as far as fire protection,” Briggs said.

While the rating is given to the district, much of it is based on the work of the fire department. Culkin Volunteer Fire Department Chief Lamar Frederick said the department had 13 active members that have put in effort to the lower rating. Essentially the classification means nothing to the Culkin Fire Department aside from the success of working to get the number lower to help out the constituents of the district.

Frederick said the fire department talked with the ratings bureau to find out what they could do to lower their rating and have been working for a while to accomplish the goal.

“It definitely feels like an accomplishment,” Lamar said. “We’re probably the only volunteer department, that I know of, in the state that has a class 6.”

The ratings are based on a number of factors including manpower, training hours, equipment and truck maintenance, water supply, water hydrants and administration work.

“Pretty much the base principle of the ratings is more of the admin. part of the fire service not the actual going out and putting out fires,” Briggs said. “They look at all the administration behind the scenes making sure training is done.”

Warren County Board of Supervisors president Richard George commended the work of the fire department in conjunction with the water district to reach this lower rating.

“It’s always good to see the fruits of that kind of organization and labor being rewarded,” George said.

Warren County has four fire protection districts outside of the city limits—Culkin, Fisher Ferry, Bovina and Eagle Lake— and six volunteer fire departments— adding Northeast and LeTourneau.

“Within the last month Bovina’s rating has dropped from a nine to an eight,” Briggs said. “Everybody else is an eight.” He expects Bovina to lower their rating again to a seven within the next six months. Briggs said his goal is to save the homeowner as much on insurance as possible.

“For the homeowners that live in the protection district, it means a lot,” Briggs said.

He said the city fire department is a class five, and any rating under a six only helps commercial property insurance and not residential.

“A class six is pretty much the lowest residential rating for a wood frame structure that you can get,” Briggs said. “Even if we were a class three it’s still going to be based off of a six. When you hit below that it helps more of the commercial businesses.”

Frederick said there is still work for the department to do in the district, specifically with the fire hydrants. Whether the rating goes down again or not, Frederick wants to continue to make sure everything is working efficiently.

Briggs is now working to expand Bovina, Culkin and Fisher Ferry’s protection district to its max. Recently, since a milage increase a few years ago, he said Fisher Ferry has gotten two trucks, Culkin got one a year ago and Bovina is set to get one this month.

“The fire service is definitely improving in the county,” Briggs said.