Volusia County recently issued the following announcement.
It’s got nearly 10,000 square feet of space, but just 736 square feet of it is dedicated to the fire station. The remainder of Volusia County Fire Rescue’s site on Tiger Bay Road in Daytona Beach, while called station 15, is used for training and an apparatus bay that houses the county’s HazMat fire engine.
The county had plans to expand and remodel the facility to convert it into a functional fire station. But now the county has a new plan – a better plan – to relocate station 15 and reduce precious response times in the process. On Tuesday, the Volusia County Council gave a unanimous thumbs up to a proposal for the county to negotiate for the purchase of the existing United Way building and property at 3747 W. International Speedway Blvd. in Daytona Beach. If the purchase goes through, the current Fire Rescue training facility would stay put and the new site will be transformed into a fully functional fire station. The new facility would shave approximately 2½ precious minutes off of Fire Rescue’s response time to get to the International Speedway Boulevard area. And the new location would strategically place the station close to other critical response routes such as I-4 and I-95.
"Minutes matter and seconds matter in response,” said County Councilwoman Heather Post in supporting the proposal along with the rest of the Council. “It’s an excellent location.”
In addition to reducing response times, Volusia County Fire Chief Howard Bailey told Council members that the new location would be closer to surrounding county and city fire stations and facilitate the stations helping each other when the need arises.
“This is a very unique opportunity for us,” Bailey told council members. “It really does tie us together very well, with not only our sister stations, but the other municipalities as well.”
The United Way has plans of its own to relocate from the current site, which includes an approximately 6,726 square foot building and more than 3 acres of land. Fire Rescue budgeted $783,000 to renovate the current station 15, with the money coming from fire impact fees and the county’s fire fund. Instead, they hope to use about $700,000 of the money to buy the United Way site, which just became available last month. The council’s decision on Tuesday authorizes the county manager to negotiate for the purchase of the building as long as the purchase price doesn’t exceed an appraisal. The purchase would have to come back to the County Council for final approval. If approved, the county will cancel the project to renovate the current station.
If the county does buy the site, the Facility Management Division in conjunction with outside contractors will determine how much it will cost to renovate the building to turn it into a working fire station.
Original source can be found here.
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