The Mutual Aid Box Alarm System (known as MABAS) Senate Bill SB 642 was approved by the Wisconsin State Legislature and signed by Governor Jim Doyle in April 5th, 2006. MABAS is a mutual aid measure that may be used for deploying fire, rescue and emergency medical services personnel in a multi-jurisdictional and/or multi-agency response.
Participation in the mutual aid program is voluntary. Equipment, personnel or services provided under MABAS are at no charge between municipalities. Expenses recovered from the responsible parties are equitably distributed. In addition, emergency personnel that respond to the emergency remain employees of their initial department or agency. MABAS is broken into divisions rather than regions.
The MABAS divisions typically follow county lines. One exception is the City of Milwaukee which has established its own MABAS division due to size and number of agencies potentially involved. Currently, twenty counties have formally established MABAS divisions and an additional 14 counties are in the process of adopting the program.
Wisconsin Emergency Management has conducted many outreach meetings throughout the state to explain the mutual aid measure. It takes 12-18 months for a MABAS division to become fully functional. Statewide the most conservative estimate is that it will take 5 years to fully implement MABAS across Wisconsin.
MABAS Division 115 in Action
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