By RICHARD WEIZEL
Staff writer
ConnPost Article Launched: 10/22/2008
HQ in the works for Stratford EMS - Topix
STRATFORD -- Donna Best, chief of the town's 120-member Emergency Medical Services unit, remembers when her department was "temporarily" assigned to a cramped section of the basement at Police Department headquarters -- 31 years ago.
"I was a volunteer at the time and didn't know what temporary meant," Best said. "But I certainly never thought it meant more than 30 years."
Best appeared Tuesday night before the town's Zoning Commission at Town Hall to plead her case for a proposed $2.2 million project to renovate the old firehouse on Main Street into the town's first EMS headquarters.
The Zoning Commission unanimously approved the proposal.
The local EMS, made up almost entirely of volunteers, operates out of a 3,000-square-foot space in the lower level of police headquarters, but would move to the 9,000-square-foot former firehouse under a plan presented by Silver Petrucelli & Associates of Hamden. The firm has prepared conceptual plans to transform the old firehouse, 2725 Main St., into an EMS center.
The unit also includes four full-time paramedics and 20 part-time paramedics and EMTs.
Best said being next door to the Fire Department's new headquarters also would help to better coordinate responses to emergencies with firefighters, as well as for training purposes.
Ever since the new $6.5 million, 27,000-square-foot firehouse and dispatch center was erected more than two years ago next door to its former base, that building has been vacant.
The consultants have determined the building is structurally sound, but needs a new roof and a "retrofitting'' to transform it into an EMS center.
"It's very exciting we may be finally getting our own building," Best said. "Our space is extremely cramped, both as far as the training room and the crew's quarters. All of our vehicles are housed outside, and this would allow us to garage our ambulances and prolong the life of vehicles."
Funding for the project will be paid for out of the EMS enterprise budget and bonded through the town, but won't cost taxpayers any money, Best said.
"I know EMS has been trying to get its own building for a long time," said Zoning Commission Chairman Christopher Silhavey, who served on the Town Council during the late 1990s and recalls how several proposals never quite made it.
"This is a perfect reuse for a building that hasn't been used in several years," he said.
The proposal will be sent to the Planning Commission at 7 p.m. Tuesday in Town Hall and then to the Town Council for final approval. The council, however, has already approved the project as part of its five-year capital improvement plan.