MODESTO, Calif. — Modesto's Fire Station 1 is 80 years old and at the end of its life, literally falling apart by the day.
It's gotten to the point where the city has made the choice to move their firefighters out of the building and into the administration building next door.
"We had water coming through the ceiling next to one of the firefighter's beds," said Modesto Fire Chief Alan Ernst. "We're not only having water leaking from the roof, but we're having water come horizontally through the walls," he said.
Over the past few years, the station has had a series of considerable leaks, making at least two offices off limits. But it wasn't until water started to drip down from the ceiling in the living quarters when the fire department decided to make a change.
All 24 of the station's firefighters — eight per shift — are being temporarily moved over to the administration building next door.
"We want to make sure that the personnel who are out in the community fighting fires and medical calls every day are comfortable and they're safe," Thomas Reeves, a spokesman for the City of Modesto said.
The good news is that firefighters won't have to go far to get to their equipment. Their new living quarters is only a few dozen feet away from where their equipment is already being stored. So Ernst says he doesn't anticipate a change in response times.
"We're putting alarm lights and speakers in the administration building, so the same type of alerting system they have here in the fire house," Ernst said.
The chief says they have three options here:
- Repair and replace the roof as is.
- Build an entirely new fire station altogether, starting from scratch.
- Do a complete retrofit from the basement to the top, bringing the building back up to code.
"Very rough ballpark. We're looking at between $5 to $15 million, depending on which option is chosen," he said.
The city is forming a committee to study this building and make a recommendation to city council on not only how to move forward, but how to pay for it too.
"There are various options that any city could take, including bonding, including going out and actually getting loans and third parties to come in and partner with them or dipping into reserve funds," Reeves said.
Keep in mind this is a city-owned building, ABC10 asked the city how they let it get to this point.
"Previous councils have not placed this on the agenda as a top priority," Reeves said. "This council currently feels that this is a priority and will address it as such."
In 2018, the Modesto City Council did approve about $700,000 worth of funding for a new roof for this building. It went out to bid twice, but no companies bid on it.
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