Next up for the Portland Business Alliance: Private firemen?

A private fire crew dispatched by a national insurance company that caters to wealthy clients is guarding 22 high-end homes threatened by the Castle Rock Fire, a blaze that has forced the evacuation of hundreds of million-dollar homes west of Ketchum.

The crew will protect only homes insured by AIG Private Client Group, an insurance company that offers “loss-prevention services” to its wealthiest customers. A truck and two-man crew sent by AIG from Montana arrived in Ketchum about 2 p.m. Wednesday to start dousing properties with Phos-Chek, the same fire retardant dropped from U.S. Forest Service aircraft.

Part of me wants to call up the PBA and ask them, in all seriousness, whether they’ve considered such a move. I mean, personally, if I were a downtown business owner, I’d be concerned about suburban shoppers being put off spending their money by regular, ordinary fire crews putting out my fires. I’d want a downtown Clean & Safe (& Not On Fire) crew to feel doubly confident of my business’s wellbeing. In all seriousness. Seriously.