Greetings, I hope this finds everyone unfrozen as we speed ahead on into Spring and Summer. Spring is planting season in Indiana, meaning we will start seeing farm machinery and support equipment on our roads moving from field to field. Be careful when approaching farm machinery from all directions and give them plenty of room to maneuver. Every year we read about farm-related accidents involving farm machinery in all parts of our great state. Spring is also the start of severe weather in our state. First responders must focus on severe weather, as strong storms, flooding, and the potential for tornadoes are a few of the elements we can expect to see during this time. Our members and departments are relied on heavily in their respective communities when storms are crossing the state. Now is the time to review your department’s severe weather plan or to make sure the weather siren for your community is working properly before the season becomes very active We have quite a few things going on in our association as I write this article for May. The biggest is our 80th Convention to be held in Indianapolis in June at The Wyndham Indianapolis West June 17th-19th . The Committee is working hard to finalize all aspects of the 3 days and to make sure you have a great time in June. During the convention we will present our state awards for 2026, elect our state officers for 2027. We will also have our annual Miss Flame Contest, and our 3rd Annual Jr. Firefighter Competition. Last year we had 4 contestants, and I am proud to announce this year we have increased that number. Hope to see you there! Please come join us and enjoy some networking while we address the business of the fire service in Indiana. Due packets were mailed to member departments in April. Please look them over and make sure all information shown on the roster sheets is correct. Change of beneficiaries and new members require forms to be submitted. Should you have questions, please reach out to your District Chairman or the Central Office. NEW for this year is the ability to pay your dues online, instructions were included in your packet On April 24th we honored this year’s 50-year Gold Card recipients at the state house this is a very special event that the IVFA puts on each year inside the state capitol. The new recipients of the gold card get a chance to meet with their legislators, get to go meet the governor. I always enjoy being there and meeting some members, and their family that have been the foundation of our organization. This year we added 92 new lifetime members. If you could not attend the event at the state house your District Chairman will be getting ahold of you or your department to get a time to set up a presentation. The IVFA has partnered with AMBA to offer our members the option to purchase insurance plans at a discounted price, along with other saving programs through AMBA. This program is a new program we are just getting started, and one I am very excited about. Stay tuned for more details. I won’t go into great detail because there are other articles that will cover this topic in detail and that is SB 270 and how will it affect the fire service. This might be a unpopular topic, but I truly believe the survival of the volunteer fire service will be the ability to be flexible, adapt. thinking outside the box, when it comes to staffing. I believe that includes forming fire territories and districts. I also believe that we need to do a better job of promoting the benefits we provide the state of Indiana and is a savings of over 6 billon dollars annually, and we need to make sure every legislature understands that what works in Indianapolis, and the surrounding area of Indy, is not how it works in rural Indiana. We hope to put together some informational meetings about SB 270, and possibly the benefits of forming fire territory or district in the near future. I urge all our members to get out and vote in the primary elections in May, primary races are very important part of the election process, no matter what party you vote for GET OUT AND VOTE!!!!! Lastly, I would like to once again send my condolences to the family, and fire departments of David Edmonson, Dave was a 45-year IVFA member, a Deputy Chief with Vanderburgh County Fire Territory, and a Plant protection Officer at Kaiser Aluminum Warrick. Dave fought a courageous battle with cancer for about a year. I had the privilege of knowing Dave for close to 20 years, he was a close friend and had been fellow co-worker, and we worked on the same shift for the last few years. The influence Dave had on the fire service in his local area will truly never be known. God Bless, and BE SAFE Ross Emery IVFA President