Kelly Kenoyer
More than six months later than expected, construction has begun on the new Sweet Home Fire and Ambulance District vehicle bay.
The project was delayed because of permitting issues, largely because a building that size could not share a lot with the existing fire building. The district had to split the lot to legally build the new structure, said Fire Chief Dave Barringer.
The project will use the last of the bond money available to the district, which came from a 2016 bond of $0.31 per $1,000 of assessed value. The bond was set to raise $1,575,000 over seven years.
The new building won’t have electricity for a while yet. Barringer said they’re waiting on installing power until they do seismic upgrades to the main building so the two can have wiring done at the same time.
The new four-bay building will give some shelter and protection to water rescue equipment, a brush rig, and several trailers and other vehicles used by the department. Most of the equipment stored in the new building are specialized vehicles for mountain and water rescues. There’s also a dedicated bay for the volunteer association, which helped with donations for the project.
“We have to keep stuff on our vehicles so we can respond to emergencies. So one side of it is theft. And one side of it is vandalism. And one side of it is losing stuff that we don’t want to lose that we need to respond to emergencies with,” Barringer said. “The other piece of it is storing it inside, out of the weather.”
“If you came out here in the morning, and that vehicle is frosted up and frosted over, you have to warm it up. It takes a little and bit that doesn’t really lend to emergencies,” he added.
The fire district will also keep some maintenance equipment in the new bay so the staff can do their own maintenance on vehicles.
“If we keep it in-house, then we save money on it by doing it ourselves,” Barringer said. Currently, that equipment is stored in the emergency bay, but it will work out better to have it out of the way in the storage bay, he said.
The building should be completed in three to four weeks, according to contractor Ryan Smothers of Savage & Smothers Construction.It won’t have temperature regulation or electricity at first, but the fire district plans to make improvements to the building over time.