Plans approved for new Falmouth fire station
WESTERN BUREAU – The Trelawny Parish Council has approved the plan, submitted by the Ministry of Local Government, for a new fire station in Falmouth. The ministry has also agreed to pay the $960,000 building fee for the facility, which is expected to cost up to $80 million, according to Falmouth Mayor Jonathon Bartley.
The existing facility, which was abandoned two years ago after huge cracks developed in several sections of the building, will be torn down and the new structure built on the same spot.
Falmouth firefighters now work from a parish council-owned building that was once the matron’s quarters for the Trelawny Infirmary. Operations were moved to that location two years ago after firefighters staged a demonstration and vowed not to work from the broken-down station. They were initially moved to the Falmouth Resort Hotel, at a cost of $40,000 each week, before later settling into their current location.
Bartley, the chairman of the Jamaica Labour Party-controlled
Trelawny Parish Council, has commended the local government ministry’s efforts to move the process along for the construction of a new fire station.
“They agreed to pay the fee, so they are leading by example,” he said.
But he had harsh words for his predecessors at the local authority, which was then controlled by the governing People’s National Party, saying their failure to properly handle the issue had cost taxpayers millions.
“The (previous) administration allowed them to do the extension on top (of the fire station) without checking on the strength of the foundation and the strength of the existing building,” Bartley said. “Erecting that on top caused the damage to the existing structure, (and it) is going to cost taxpayers over $50 million to $80 million now to do a new thing.”
Those funds, he said, could have been used to supply equipment for the parish’s limping fire department that only has a single working fire unit.
“If they (the previous parish councillors) did not do that then we would still have a new building. And that money that they are going to take to now build the new structure could buy two fire trucks,” Bartley argued.
