Selectmen Review A New Hook & Ladder Firehouse Proposal

By John Voket

After Newtown Hook & Ladder officials said they spent about $100,000 of the $750,000 raised for a new headquarters just trying to clear legal hurdles to build the facility on donated land off Sugar Street without success, and also considering another privately owned parcel, the company is setting its sights on a possible location within a few hundred feet of its present, dangerously deteriorating firehouse.

Project liaison, firefighter, and Fire Commissioner Rob Manna handled much of the presentation. He said the volunteer company was coming before the selectmen to ascertain whether the new location and the land lease that would be required to develop it would be acceptable to the board before the company committed additional funds for the professional services, and engaging the land use process required to move the new proposal forward.

Commissioner Manna displayed a sketch showing the new site, which would face the back of Edmond Town Hall and be located in the lowest rear section of the public parking area behind the Main Street building. He explained that once a new fire station is completed, the old building would be demolished, compensating for some but not all the spaces that would be lost to the new facility.

Pointing to the sketch, the volunteer traced the entrance and exit paths for apparatus that would eventually align with the existing exit from the lot. Mr Manna said that defined parking areas and new parking islands planted with flowering trees would help delineate the point where the fire apparatus exit would merge with and share the public driveway from behind Edmond Town Hall.

Hook & Ladder President Rick Camejo said it was unclear how many parking spots were available in the lower lot because the area was never striped. Mr Manna added that an unspecified number of new spaces would also be added in the 60- by 60-foot area that was formerly restricted in front of the existing fire station.

“We feel once we can have engineers involved, they’ll have a better idea of what’s involved and where there can be parking,” Mr Camejo said.

Selectman James Gaston asked whether the proposed location was within a wetlands area, and Mr Manna replied that the site was within a regulated area, but it did not encroach into wetlands.

“We know there are wetlands in the back, so we will have to go before the wetlands commission,” he said. “The last proposal we were in the wetlands.”

Mrs Llodra then asked if the project had any budget for required site work that would have to be done to make the new location ready for construction, whether any such funding would be borne by Hook & Ladder, and if not, where would the site preparation funds come from.

Mr Manna said that the site was the most financially attractive considering the funds available, and that if site work had to be addressed, it could be considered as part of a “Phase 2 concept.”

Mrs Llodra observed that any site work might come with a “hefty price tag on it,” and that there was some assumption that the expense would be part of the public funding earmarked for the new fire station.

Saying there was a plan to apply for grants to underwrite some site work, Mr Manna, said there also might be some consideration for the town highway department to perform some of the site work, since it involved a public parking lot.

Develop Land Lease

Mrs Llodra said that part of the next step would be to work on a land lease for the parcel in question, and that fire company officials should be working concurrently with town and Borough of Newtown boards that are involved in granting the necessary permits for the project. She said the land lease would have to come back before the selectmen and before residents in a public hearing, but she would not be inclined to see the project through to that point if other officials determined the project as proposed was unworkable.

Mr Gaston said he wanted to see a proposed design that was concrete enough, would receive the necessary approvals, and would bring the project in on budget. Selectman Will Rodgers apologized that officials presenting the concept plan were already being peppered with questions.

“But we have to have a little more, especially about the parking,” Mr Rodgers said.

Mrs Llodra then took up the issue of a $1.5 million earmarked in three $500,000 installments, to help the nonprofit fire company pay down its mortgage on the new facility, stating that any land lease would have to contain language protecting the town’s investment. This would be, in part, because Hook & Ladder is the only town fire service that does not currently own its own building.

“The issue is, should Hook & Ladder go defunct, or should we go to a totally paid department, Hook & Ladder will own the facility. But that ownership is being created with public money,” Mrs Llodra said. So she would seek legal language to ensure the town could recoup its funding of the project, similarly to the arrangement being proposed by the local Ambulance Association for a planned headquarters at Fairfield Hills.

The first selectman said while she could direct the town attorney to begin working on a proposed land lease document for the project, she warned that the Board of Finance and Legislative Council might not be receptive to a phased plan, and could require assurances that part of any public money would be used to restore as much parking as possible behind Edmond Town Hall once the new fire station was built and the old building was demolished.

“There has to be a really clear plan as to how we get from where we are now to that,” Mrs Llodra said, pointing at the plan. She also assured the fire officials that many town agents and agencies were in full support of a new headquarters plan for their company, but she was concerned about where to derive any funds for required site work.

Mr Manna said that if site work funds were required to come from the $1.5 million in town funding, the project might not be completed.

“We had a rough estimate drawn up and it was in the half-million dollar range, but that included the entire site,” he said, “so we would have to go back and try to identify the [cost of] site work outside the building.”

A Better Idea?

Mr Rodgers said it might make more sense to get all related site work completed first, “and then you sort of work at your leisure on the rest of it.”

And Mr Gaston said he thought the concept, as presented, looked good — and he supported the company going forward with initiating the required municipal processes to get the project on track.

“The presenting problem hasn’t gone away; you’re in a failing building,” Mrs Llodra said. “The real problem is where do we get the dollars and cents to do it all at the same time so you can achieve your goal, and we can [fix the parking issue] as well.”

Both Mrs Llodra and Mr Rodgers suggested the fire company approach the Edmond Town Hall Board of Managers about the proposal, and to seek ideas from those officials.

Mrs Llodra then asked Fire Commission Chair Kevin Cragin if he had any input, and he replied, “I don’t like seeing this fire company getting beat up. They got beat up the last time.”

Mr Cragin said Hook & Ladder should have been cleared to develop the site they had donated to them on Route 302. That parcel was made available by the Smith Family Trust and R. Scudder Smith, publisher of The Newtown Bee.

Mrs Llodra said the town has done everything it could to move the project along, and said that many officials are supporting the “extraordinary gift” of $1.5 million so the fire company can eventually stand on its own in its own headquarters.

“We’re not pulling back on that commitment, we’re standing by it,” Mrs Llodra said.

Referring to the recently completed high school addition, Mr Cragin replied that “we did a project a couple of years ago for $41 million that we probably didn’t need. And maybe we would have been better off giving these guys three or four million and saving the Town of Newtown $37 million. Everybody would have been better off.”