Pine Grove Fire Department in Rotterdam is running out of space and fails to meet regulatory requirements at its 40-year-old facility, but they’re hoping the public will support its plan.
The station was built in 1970 when equipment and fire trucks were very different from modern standards. Inside the building there are often tight spaces firefighters have to navigate as they suit up. The building’s existing truck bays can’t safely accommodate fire apparatus to meet the current National Fire Protection Association codes and standards. The roof was repaired several times in the past and the department is now looking to replace it. Also, the community room used to be a polling location, but the ramp is no longer ADA approved. The total cost of the project will not exceed a proposed $3.5 million bond to be paid over 25 years.
“We are out of space and times have changed in what it takes to be a fireman,” said Fire Commissioner Herb LeTarte III. “The best use of taxpayer dollars was to go for this bond. If we’d tried to fix what we have we would be kicking a can up the street.”
Currently, the building is scheduled for over $1.1 million in repairs over the next three to five years, but LeTarte said this is only a short-term solution to its problems. The expansion would include a fire truck bay, which could house four trucks, a work room would be added inside of a lobby area. The community room would also be moved and separated from the emergency operations and important files would be properly protected.
Making sure the fire fighters stay safe and can operate efficiently is the focus of the project, said LeTarte.
“Right now we don’t have a shower in the building, so when you go to a fire and get the carcinogens all over you what you are supposed to do is come back, throw your turnout gear in a washer and dryer made for turnout gear because it ways so much, but we don’t have the space to put it,” said LeTarte.
Right now much of the gear is visibly soiled, but he said with a consumer dryer donated to the department they only can wash one coat at a time.
Fire trucks, as they become more modern, have gotten longer. This has reduced the amount of space in the station and he said there is no place to clean anything. He said firemen used to just ride on the back or sides of the truck and hold on tight, but now all firemen are requirement to be housed inside the vehicle. Older trucks the fire department has were grandfathered in even though they don’t meet modern requirements.
The flooding slightly changed the plan, but not the overall cost. The a new generator would be purchased, to replace the old generator from around the 1940s, and placed upstairs out of harms way from the flood. All the utilities, which are downstairs, would be moved upstairs. A lot of records, which were downstairs on a lower shelf in the storage room were lost during the recent flooding.
“We lost a lot of records. These are our vital records … but we lost several of our vital records,” he said.
The estimated cost impact of the project, according to the department, would b e a tax levy increase of 0.77 percent Rotterdam residents served totaling an estimated tax increase of $154 for the average home assessed at $200,000. The department also serves Princetown and Guilderland residents.
Also, another helping hand is always welcome at the department.
“We still only got 32 guys, which is what the department started with in 1933,” said LeTarte. “We are always looking for new members.”
Anybody interested in being a volunteer fireman at the department, he said, can stop down at the station located on Dunnsville Road, in Rotterdam.
