Council gives staff direction to pursue Boozer site for Fire Station 72 after wide public comment

City staff presented a comparative site assessment for a planned replacement of Fire Station 72 and, after more than an hour of public comment and council discussion, the council directed staff to pursue the Boozer site (adjacent to Walmart) for further negotiation and due diligence.

Deputy City Manager Joan Brown summarized three candidate parcels: the privately owned Boozer site (2.6 acres, appraisal ≈$1.0M, wetlands requiring mitigation and approximately a 23-second response-time improvement in modeling); the Jimmy Moore Park site (city-owned, ~3.31 acres) that would require a future land-use amendment and was estimated to cost roughly $11.95 million to construct under the current design; and the Bell properties (three contiguous parcels totaling ~6.23 acres), which included substantial wetlands and unknown remediation needs and for which staff had limited due diligence access without a purchase contract.

Staff explained trade-offs: Boozer requires acquisition, wetland mitigation, and easement negotiations (possible driveway access with adjacent property owners), but has no land-use amendment requirement; Jimmy Moore is owned by the city (no acquisition cost) and carries no wetlands but would need a future land-use amendment, and residents voiced strong opposition to locating the station there because it would reduce park green space and affect playgrounds and mature trees.

Public commenters urged the council to avoid placing the station in Jimmy Moore Park and to preserve green space; others suggested Bell or Boozer alternatives and asked about sale or reuse of the existing station site. Fire Department representatives described the operational need for a new station, the deficiencies of the existing 1960s-era facility and the benefits a new facility would offer for personnel, equipment and emergency staging.

Councilmembers recorded ranked preferences during discussion; a majority favored pursuing Site 1 (Boozer) and asked staff to proceed with negotiations, environmental and geotechnical studies and easement discussions. Staff reported they had issued a nonbinding letter of intent to initiate pricing discussions and said they would return with a proposed contract for council review when due diligence is complete.

Next steps: staff will continue contract negotiations and due diligence on the Boozer property, complete environmental and geotechnical assessments under a due-diligence contract, and report back with a formal purchase agreement and cost estimates for site development and long-term capital planning.