NEW GLOUCESTER – A committee charged with making a recommendation on a new fire station met Tuesday to list the needs for the volunteer fire and rescue department.
Town Manager Rosemary Kulow said the town is seeking to buy between eight and 10 acres on Route 100 between Upper Village and White’s Corner to build a 20,000-square-foot station. She said selectmen hope to bring a proposal to voters at the annual town meeting next May.
Selectmen have been negotiating a land purchase for several months but taken no action.
Committee member A. Wayne Cobb said the fire and rescue department uses five buildings to house its equipment and supplies, and most of them are too small.
The Upper Gloucester Highway Department has three pieces of equipment at the Upper Station. The Lower Gloucester station stores two firetrucks and a rescue truck in two bays. The old fire station, which has no heat, has a Model A firetruck. Forestry trucks are stored at a stable along with ladders, tires, shelving, Indian pumps and other material.
At Lower Gloucester, a meeting room and single unit shower/laundry facility serves volunteer members who come off calls to be decontaminated.
For more than a decade, town leaders have grappled with whether to build a central station or add satellite locations.
A list of department needs includes a 50-by-50-foot meeting room, laundry room, 10 bays, four offices for fire and rescue administrators, a conference room, kitchen, repair shop, storage space, an exercise room, two compressor rooms to fill equipment and secure record storage space.
The building design would have to have expansion capability.
New Gloucester has no public water supply and relies on fire ponds to fill its pumper trucks.
The committee will meet at 7 p.m. Aug. 23 at the Meeting House in Lower Gloucester. Discussion will focus on a building design.
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