Fire Station Expansion Project
YOU SPOKE…WE LISTENED
In October 2019 voters of Winchendon rejected monies for the architectural plans and build document phase of a new fire station. The two major points brought up on town floor by the Finance Committee were the need to go before Capital Planning and the need to reduce the price. The current fire station proposal has now been before Capital Planning and other boards multiple times and with a lot of hard work the price has been reduced by almost $4 million dollars, even during these times of pandemic prices, by reconfiguring the size and layout.
After unanimous support at the Capital Planning meeting to move forward, the fire department is hoping that the Board of Selectmen put the proposed article forward to the voters at the Fall 2022 Town Meeting. In potential preparation of this, the department will be conducting various informational meetings, Zoom platforms, Facebook posts, FAQ handouts and various other ways to get the information out to the voters. Dates for these will be out soon.
FACILITY NEEDS STUDY vs DESIGN SERVICES
In October 2018 Winchendon voters took the first step in the future of the fire station expansion project by passing an article to conduct a facility needs study. This basic study takes 59 pages of gathered information about the current station, members, call volume, etc and professionally fits it to what would be necessary for the Winchendon Fire Department. From this study a building concept is designed to best fit the needs for the town. The information that was paid for in 2018 is still being used here in 2022 to maximize the financial benefits for the town.
Potentially in October of 2022 the Winchendon voters will be asked to take the second step in the project by passing an article for design services. These design services will provide the project with actual architectural plans and documents to go out to bid on the project. By proceeding in this order the plan is to have an exact number in hand when we come before the town at a future town meeting for the construction. This phase will take roughly ten months so the earliest the town would see the third phase appear would be fall of 2023.
In the past some building projects have seen monies be passed at town meeting only to see bids come in quite a bit higher. By reversing the order of the requests the fire department is working diligently with the Town Manager and Capital Planning to ensure the final construction cost brought to the voters is exactly that….final.
NEED FOR SEPARATE MALE AND FEMALE SLEEPING QUARTERS
Currently at the Winchendon Fire Department there is one large bedroom and one shower for all staff to share. This setup worked well when the station was built and there were minimal staff on shift. It was also based on a time when there were few women in the fire service. Currently Winchendon is fortunate enough to have a great female full time firefighter as well as other female per diem firefighters. Unfortunately they are thrown into the mix of everyone in the same room and forced to share shower and toilet facilities with the male firefighters. These arrangements are often uncomfortable for both the men and the women. Our department has had female firefighters work shifts only to feel they needed to sleep in a chair in the dayroom to give the males their privacy. Forcing any firefighter to share accommodations like this is disrespectful.
The proposed new station would allow for each firefighter on shift (of any gender or non-gender) to have their own bedroom. These bedrooms would allow for basic on shift privacy and would give members a private area to dress and to sleep on the overnight. It would also give members an area to decompress after an especially bad call. Some members currently have very different sleep habits which this setup would accommodate. The Town has already shown the understanding of the need for separate areas by putting a male and female locker room in the police station. By doing this same thing in the fire station it would allow the town to show that they really are an equal opportunity employer instead of showing the female firefighters that they are expected to conform to existing conditions. This expectation is NOT RIGHT and really must be changed.