Check out new station
Fire department open house, tours set Saturday

Record-Courier
April 3, 2004

Kent residents will have an opportunity to tour their new fire station this weekend.

The Kent Fire Department is sponsoring an open house Saturday at its newly rebuilt fire station on South DePreyster Street. The open house will be held between 1 and 5 p.m. with tours throughout the day.

Fire Chief James Williams said the building is 90 percent complete and already, the fire fighters have noticed a remarkable difference.

"I'm not sure I can even describe the change," he said. "The space is much larger and more efficient. It's a tremendous improvement."

The project consisted of two phases that essentially built a new fire station around the old one. First, contractors completed a new office and living quarters next to the old service bays. Then the old office and living quarters were razed and replaced by three more service bays. The old service bays, now in the middle of the building, are all that remains of the old station.

Williams said the new service bays are expected to be almost completely done by the open house, but there is still six to eight weeks of work to be done on the exterior of the building, such as landscaping and driveway aprons. However, it will still be complete before June, the original scheduled date of completion.

Contractors were able to move faster on the project because the city gave them permission to begin construction on the exterior walls of the new service bays around the office and living quarters. The original plan was to wait until the old building was vacated and razed.

"With the winter we had, that was a good decision," Williams said. "By allowing them to start in September, it gave them an opportunity to get a lot done before the weather got bad."

The station, which will cost $4 million total, includes separate quarters for male and female firefighters, enough bay space to house all the department's equipment in-house, and training room on-site.

The station also has a hose tower that was built with the intention of using it for training exercises. Firefighters can simulate high-rise rescue, rope rescue and rescuing people out of windows without going off site to do those exercises. Previously the firefighters had to go places such as the Police Department, Tower 43 or the Kent State University campus to run such exercises, which had an impact on response time. It's a benefit to our folks and the community as well." Williams said.