1. The board of county commissioners may by ordinance create a district for a fire department. The board of county commissioners is ex officio the governing body of any district created pursuant to this section and may:

(a) Organize, regulate and maintain the fire department.

(b) Appoint and prescribe the duties of the fire chief.

(c) Designate arson investigators as peace officers.

(d) Regulate or prohibit the storage of any explosive, combustible or inflammable material in or transported through the county, and prescribe the distance from any residential or commercial area where it may be kept. Any ordinance adopted pursuant to this paragraph that regulates places of employment where explosives are stored must be at least as stringent as the standards and procedures adopted by the Division of Industrial Relations of the Department of Business and Industry pursuant to NRS 618.890.

(e) Establish, by ordinance, a fire code and other regulations necessary to carry out the purposes of this section.

(f) Include the budget of the district in the budget of the county.

(g) Hold meetings of the governing body of the district in conjunction with the meetings of the board of county commissioners without posting additional notices of the meetings within the district.

2. Except as otherwise provided in subsection 6, if the fire department transports sick or injured persons to a medical facility, the board of county commissioners shall adopt an ordinance:

(a) Requiring the fire department to defray the expenses of furnishing such transportation by imposing and collecting fees; and

(b) Establishing a schedule of such fees.

3. The board of county commissioners of a county whose population is 700,000 or more shall, when adopting an ordinance pursuant to subsection 2:

(a) Limit the number of transports of sick or injured persons to a medical facility that may be made by the fire department to not more than 1,000 such transports per year, except that the fire department may, exclusive of the limit, make any such emergency transport that is necessary for the health or life of a sick or injured person when other ambulance services are not available; and

(b) Require the fire department and all other ambulance services operating in the county to report to the board:

(1) The total number of transports of sick or injured persons to a medical facility that are made each month; and

(2) For each transport reported pursuant to subparagraph (1):

(I) The fees charged to transport the person to a medical facility;

(II) Whether the person had health insurance at the time of the transport; and

(III) The name of the medical facility where the fire department or ambulance service transported the person to or from.

4. The other officers and employees of the county shall perform duties for the district that correspond to the duties they perform for the county.

5. All persons employed to perform the functions of the fire department are employees of the county for all purposes.

6. The provisions of subsection 2 do not apply to any county for which a nonprofit corporation has been granted an exclusive franchise for ambulance service in that county.

(Added to NRS by 1979, 925; A 1985, 257; 1989, 75, 194; 1999, 1857; 2001, 999; 2009, 1236; 2011, 1102)