Council weighs East Side fire station site, staffing and funding options

City of Watertown fire officials and staff presented site recommendations, staffing scenarios and funding options for a proposed East Side fire station during the council work session.

Fire Chief Roland and Assistant Chief Scott reviewed a multi-phase proposal that begins with site acquisition, proceeds to phased staffing and culminates in construction. Staff identified five candidate sites and recommended a parcel on 119th Street NE as the top choice based on geographic response-time modeling; staff said response times to large parts of the Northeast and Southeast of the city would fall under the target ambulance and fire response windows at that location.

Chief Roland said the city now handles roughly 3,000 ambulance calls and about 1,000 fire calls per year and that the East Side accounts for roughly a third of ambulance responses. The presentation cited national guidance: the American Heart Association’s standard of arriving in five minutes or less for many ambulance responses and NFPA/ISO metrics for fire response and department grading. Assistant Chief Scott said the city’s ISO rating could drop to a class 3 if coverage to the east is not improved; a worse ISO rating can increase homeowner insurance costs across the district.

Staff offered a three-phase approach: (1) buy a site (staff recommended the 119th Street NE parcel, estimated at about $600,000, with contract-for-deed options), (2) implement staffing (staff proposed nine full‑time firefighters on a phased schedule and suggested 3–6 ambulance staffing if the council wished to begin with ambulance-only service) and (3) build a station. The packet included a rough $5 million figure for a 10,000‑square‑foot building; staff noted cost-per-square-foot data from recent regional station builds.

Council and staff reviewed funding options. Staff flagged these pathways: an ambulance-service district levy (county-level vote April 22 was cited as a pending action that could generate about $1 million to help staffing), use of ambulance billing revenue (estimates of $300,000–$600,000 per year), SAFER (Staffing for Adequate Fire and Emergency Response) grants — which staff said favor full requests that align with NFPA 1710 staffing levels — general obligation bonds (which would put the obligation on property taxes rather than sales tax) and other grants including Community Development Block Grant and developer impact fees.

On operations, the chief recommended planning for nine full-time firefighting positions and noted a full NFPA 1710 compliant crew on a single engine would require higher staffing (staff noted SAFER grant competitiveness rises if the request is large enough to meet NFPA 1710 thresholds). Council members asked whether the project could begin as an ambulance-only facility with subsequent expansion; staff said it could, but cautioned that running an ambulance-only station with too few staff risks frequent “brownouts” (an unstaffed station when crews are unavailable).

Council members asked about property‑tax impacts and timing. CFO Bob Seaman said the city’s property-tax levy has fallen in recent years because prior bonds were paid off; a general-obligation bond would shift some pressure to property tax. Staff also proposed phasing: purchase the site now to "put a stake in the ground" and evaluate funding later. Chief Roland urged council to act on a land purchase to preserve a suitable site for long-term response needs.

Ending: Council expressed broad support for the project’s public-safety goals but sought further information on staffing cost models, funding scenarios and whether an ambulance-only start would be financially and operationally feasible. No formal action was taken; staff will return with more detailed cost and financing options if the council directs.