Group to eye Fire Station work report
KINGSTON, N.Y. » Mayor Steve Noble will appoint a working group to closely examine a report that concluded about $3.8 million of improvement work is needed at the Central Fire Station in Midtown.
At a meeting Wednesday, City Engineer Ralph Swenson asked the Common Council’s Finance and Audit Committee to consider creating such a group to determine whether Kingston should rehabilitate the firehouse on East O’Reilly Street or construct a new building.
He said it is a big decision to make and now is the time for officials to start working on the matter. Swenson asked that the working group be appointed before fall.
Finance Committee Chairman Doug Koop, D-Ward 2, initially said the working group should be made up of aldermen from the committee, but Swenson said members of the council should be
a part of the review. Swenson said it was necessary for the council members to be invested in the process.
“In the end, it’s the Common Council that’s going to make the decision,” Swenson said.
The committee eventually decided to ask Noble
to appoint a working group of five to seven members to review the report, which was released last month. Three of those members are to be from the Common Council. The mayor and Fire Chief Mark Brown would also be part of the process.
Swenson said the working group should also interview interested parties who might have insight, such as engineers and the
assistant fire chief.
The report, by Lathambased consulting firm C.T. Male Associates, outlined significant repairs said to be needed, as well as work to bring the Midtown building up to current standards. The firm then created a document that broke the initial report into high-, mediumand low-priority needs in the 110-year-old structure.
The high-priority work alone would cost less than everything suggested in the initial report, but still amount to nearly $2 million. That is more than half of C.T. Male’s total estimate of $3,796,868.
The C.T. Male reports came on the heels of one prepared by Peak Engineering that said reinforcements to the firehouse’s concrete floor, where fire trucks are
parked, had deteriorated significantly.
Swenson told the committee the floor issue, for instance, would not be a simple replacement.
The floor where the trucks are parked was cited in the original C.T. Male report and was deemed a “high priority” in the follow-up document. C.T. Male and city officials have estimated the floor project alone would cost
about $860,000 because it would require demolition and replacement.
Work classified as being of “medium priority” would cost about $1.65 million, while “low priority” work would cost roughly $719,000.
The Central Fire Station, a block and a half from Broadway and adjacent to the city’s Department of Public Works building, was built in 1907 and 1908.