What will the future hold for Bowling Green’s safety services?

Council on Tuesday heard about the potential for new fire stations as well as repairs and renovations for the aging police division building.

“There’s nothing more important than safety,” read the opening to the city’s Future of Safety Services white paper, which was distributed at themeeting, and which details the issues.

“It is the baseline of our lives every day and it is the unstated assumption in every plan we make for the future. … We are committed to ensuring a safe community by providing adequate facilities for our first responders and by minimizing time it takes to respond to your emergency.”

Mayor Mike Aspacher noted that council recently passed legislation allowing the city to engage the services of a design professional to address the problems, and that work is ongoing, he said.

The city is assessing both facilities and assembling information that might provide a path forward as they begin to address their deficiencies, Aspacher said, and an important component of that process is sharing information with the public and listening to residents’ priorities. Currently, he said, representatives of the BG police and fire divisions are making presentations to service groups on the matter.

According to the white paper, there are two emerging issues confronting the fire division. The first concerns the condition of the Court Street station which, it states, is “currently unsustainable.”

The station, which turns 40 years old this October, is not acceptable and will be prohibitively expensive to bring up to current standards. The white paper notes that no major improvements have been made to the station since its construction, and the building has “significant structural deficiencies. Additionally, the aging HVAC system, roof and plumbing need to be replaced.”

Among other issues, the building is not compliant with current health, safety, and ADA regulations; it has settled more than six inches from front to back; and the station itself was built for an all-male workforce. For example, the city recently retrofitted a closet to provide a bathroom for female firefighters, the document states.

Further, “the vehicle bays are just barely able to hold today’s larger equipment. The slide for firefighters to slide down from their living quarters to the truck bay is not safe,” the document stated.

A second issue is response time to emergencies.

“The fire division’s response goals are met for 74% of all fire incidents, the white paper stated. “About one-quarter of fire responses (26%) are longer than the standard.” Additionally, 18% of EMS responses are longer than the standard.

“Because nearly 70% of the time the fire department is responding to simultaneous calls, response time impacts all residents, even those who live near a station,” the paper said.

According to the paper, the city asked the Ohio Fire Chiefs Association to look into the problem. They came up with two options: replace the Court Street station with a single station further east, or replace Court Street with two stations, one on the east side of the city and the other further north – an option which significantly reduces response time.

The paper further notes that “by improving response times and travel distances from responding stations, the city’s fire rating from the Insurance Services Office … can be decreased, which lowers property insurance costs for homes and businesses.” Further, “the property where the Court Street station is located would be a prime location for economic development, bringing additional revenue to the city. It would work in concert with the city’s Gateway District.”

An issue for the police division is the aging police station building, located at the southeast corner of West Wooster and Church streets. The structure was built in 1893 and renovated in the mid-1980s. However, the white paper notes, 40 years later, there is significant deterioration of the structure and functional changes are needed.

The paper stated that the interior layout is not efficiently organized for a modern police operation, the building is difficult to access for the public looking to receive services, the facility itself is deteriorating, and its roof, HVAC and mechanical systems are all in need of replacement.

The paper noted that “a path forward could be to renovate the current building as was done in the mid-1980s, preserving the face of the building and the tower. The interior of the building would be renovated to organize space that meets the needs of a modern police operation and is more adaptable to the future. An addition would be constructed on the south side of the building that would allow for increased public parking and an accessible ground floor dispatch center.

During Tuesday’s meeting, fire Chief Bill Moorman, and Deputy Police Chief Justin White delivered to council the presentation they have been making to area groups.

“The last time Bowling Green Fire asked for any major assistance from our community was 1997,” to hire additional firefighters, said Moorman.

“The problem is, we’re out of space,” White said of the police building. He also noted that dispatch is located on the second floor, something which is unusual with policing facilities. Further, he noted that the building’s HVAC system is so old that, when it needed repairs in recent years, a retired repairman familiar with their outdated system had to be called in.

The public engagement process is set to continue into the fall, and city leadership is to then take the feedback gained from community engagement, along with the results from a forthcoming study – including financial projections – and recommend a course of action to council.