When elected officials show up for a ground-breaking in their own hard hats and safety vests, you know they’re excited. North Bend Councilman Ross Loudenback was already explaining “they told us to wear this stuff,” as he strode onto the site of the future North Bend Fire Station Wednesday, July 25, but he didn’t need an excuse.
Nearly all of the 50-some people gathered for the ground-breaking on the future Station 87 were looking forward to the project getting under way, especially the pre-school class that trooped across the street that morning for a closer look.
“They are so excited,” said Jackie Charbonneau, a teacher at Mount Si Montessori. “We’ve been watching them (clear the site) for weeks!”
The students watched eagerly as North Bend Mayor Ken Hearing, standing on the track of a huge earth-mover, spoke briefly about the project and the number of agencies that had to cooperate to make it happen. Their wait paid off. After the officials took their turns with the golden shovels, the children were invited to do the same, and they jumped at the chance.
Representatives of nearly all the agencies — Eastside Fire & Rescue, Fire District 38, North Bend Fire and the city of North Bend, Bellevue EMS and King County EMS — came to the celebration, along with several who were former board members for Eastside Fire & Rescue, who wanted to support the project. The “two Joes” from Issaquah, Russell Joe and Joe Forkner, wanted to be part of the event to support what they consider a family, they said.
“This was a long time coming,” said Forkner, “and it’s one of those things that just makes sense.”
“The infrastructure improvements for any one partner make the whole much, much stronger, and enable us to serve as a regional fire service, which is the way I envisioned Eastside Fire & Rescue when it was being formed in 1999,” added Joe.
The new station will house up to eight firefighters and medics, who essentially live at the station on their 24-hour shifts. It will also have five full-size equipment bays, a big improvement over the current station. One of the three bays in the current station 87 is not big enough for a standard-size rescue vehicle.
“We actually had to change our medic unit because of the space restrictions,” said Battalion Chief Mark Moultan, with the Bellevue Emergency Medical Services unit that staffs the station.
The $4.1 million station will also be outside of the floodplain, and built to current seismic standards for public safety buildings. The project is expected to be complete in mid-July 2013.
Funding for the new station is from two voter-approved bonds, from Fire District 38 and the city of North Bend, totaling $5.2 million.
Ron Pedee, chairperson of the board of directors for F.D. 38, said it was a difficult prospect to bring a bond to voters in early 2011.
“Fortunately, we were able to ‘make the sale,’ and now this community will benefit for many, many years,” he said.
