Lehigh Fire and Rescue Commissioner Ralph Hemingway voted along with two union members on the board of the fire panel late Thursday afternoon to keep a resolution active that the board passed last month to ask the voters of Lehigh to pay a $100 a parcel special assessment fee to bring money in to the ailing fire district that is facing layoffs and possible closing of stations.

A motion was made midway through the special meeting held at the East Lee County Regional Library’s meeting room where around 75 people attended, by Commissioner David Adams to cancel the resolution.

He said many people had talked to him and said because of the economic situation in Lehigh, they were not willing to pay an extra $100 a parcel to bail out the fire department. The $100 fee would be in addition to the 3 mils the board voted for last month, after learning that property valuation in Lehigh had declined 49 percent, meaning less revenue for the fire district.

Commissioner Julie Barrett seconded Adams’ motion and the crowd at the library applauded loudly.

When the commissioners voted, Joel Guzman, Jeff Berndt and Hemingway voted to keep the resolution alive to ask for a special election.

A smaller group of people cheered. They appeared to be employees of the Lehigh Acres Fire Dept.

Several people told commissioners they were against the special assessment tax which even if passed in an election in December, the money would not be available to balance this year’s budget which must be struck by the end of September. Several people told the commissioners and the chief to do their job and work with the money they have.

Several people complained that the “information with the numbers” is not even up on the fire district’s website. Berndt promised it would be put up on the Internet site.

Harold Doidge told commissioners he owned five parcels and that he could not afford to pay $500 in extra tax, in addition to increased school taxes and other taxes.

“I’m not paying you the $500 in extra tax, not until Hell freezes over,” he said.

Adams, who made the motion to forego to the special election to tax 128,000 parcels in Lehigh $100 said he had not had one person tell him they would vote for the tax.

Following the meeting, the board went into executive discussion to begin deliberations with union bosses for the 2009-10 budget.