Fire station grant makes overdue Kan. project possible

By Darcy Gray
The Hutchinson News

NEWTON, Kan. — The city of Newton has been awarded more than $2.9 million toward the construction of a new fire department on the city's south side.

Newton was the only place in Kansas to receive stimulus funding from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act's Fire Station Construction Grant Program.

About $210 million in stimulus funds was set aside for fire station construction, and there were more than 6,000 applicants, Newton Fire Chief Gary Denny said. The application process was "highly competitive," he said, with $9 billion in funding requests.

"This is big, to be the only Kansas department awarded this money," Denny said Wednesday when the funding was announced. "We feel extremely honored and fortunate we were blessed with this grant opportunity.

"We were in the right position at the right time."

Newton officials have been discussing and planning to build the city's third fire station for more than a decade, Denny said, so detailed plans had already taken shape.

"Fortunately, we started this process years ago," he said.

Plans began in the '90s to build a fire station on property from the Newton Medical Center, but the project fell through, Denny said, and the property was turned back over to the medical center.

The city has two fire stations, on East Third Street and West Broadway.

But because Newton has grown significantly over the past 10 years, fire officials' goal of responding to a call within 4 minutes has been compromised, pressing the need for a third fire station, Denny said.

"Our response time needs to be equal to or less than 4 minutes, from the time we leave the station to the time we arrive on scene," he said. "South of U.S. 50, though, all of that area exceeds the 4-minute response time we adopted."

In 2006, following a resource study, a consultant recommended the city construct a new fire station on the south side, Denny said.

The city of Newton in June 2008 purchased about 6 acres of land for the new station at 2600 S. Kansas. In March, officials began working on the station's design in anticipation of stimulus funding.

The plans call for a 12,275-square-foot station, which will also serve as an EMS station, at a cost of $3.6 million.

The city of Newton will fund the remaining cost of the project, although it has not been decided what funds the city will use, said Erin McDaniel, the city's public information officer.

The new station will house four to eight firefighters with full living quarters, and it will include a two-bay drive-through and "green" design elements.

"We had the need, we had the property purchased, we had the people and we had the equipment — we just didn't have the money to build it," Denny said. "With the economy the way it is, I doubt the city of Newton would have been able to proceed with this process without the stimulus money.

"We feel extremely honored and fortunate that we were blessed with this grant opportunity."

Copyright 2009