Locals had a chance to learn more about a couple of the big ticket capital projects being considered by the City of Merritt for this upcoming year, at a budget open house hosted in council chambers on Tuesday evening.
Sitting at the top of that list is the phase two expansion of the fire hall on Nicola Avenue, a project with a projected pricetag of $2.2 million — which would likely require the city to borrow funds, said Sheila Thiessen, director of finance for the City of Merritt.
Though council has yet to set the property tax rate for 2017, Thiessen explained that without other sources of funding, such as grants, it would take “forever” for the city to set aside enough in reserve funds to pay for the project without borrowing.
“I’ve only been here for a year so I can’t really speak for council — but my impression is that [the City of Merritt] hasn’t used a lot of debt if they [didn’t] need to. But for larger projects, that’s generally the only way. Otherwise it would take you forever,” said Thiessen.
She added that the city is limited by how much debt they can incur over a given period of time — and if the debt was to be paid for over a period of longer than five years, the project would require some kind of community approval process.
“There’s a few different ways to do that — you can do a referendum, you can do an alternative approval process, which has been used most recently in the past here. You put out all the information, and then if people object to it, they can come in and register that they object. If you get a certain number of objections, then you either have to go to referendum or drop the project,” explained Thiessen.
Increased responsibilities creates need for greater space
Artistic renders show the proposed expansion from two different angles. (Photos courtesy of Merritt Fire Rescue).
Merritt Fire Chief Dave Tomkinson was on hand at the budget open house on Tuesday evening, making the case to those interested as to why Merritt is due for a fire hall expansion.
Plans for the expansion of the fire hall have been around for a number of years, said Tomkinson, but for one reason or another, the project never received the necessary funding from city hall.
The preliminary plans for the expansion, which were on display at the open house, featured floor plans for both the ground level and upper floors of the new wing. The expansion would include new contamination and decontamination facilities, as well as living spaces for the work experience program firefighters.
The WEP firefighters are currently housed in a trailer outside the fire hall, which is leased each month.
“We’re dealing with really a few things. Health and safety issues with respect to contamination and decontamination. We’re at a greater risk of cancers and whatnot due to the job,” said Tomkinson. “Having facilities for our female firefighters — we have a number of female firefighters but we don’t have specialized facilities. We have one shower in the whole station for 45 people.”
The plans included a number of elements to make life a little bit easier for the more than 40 volunteer firefighters who make up the bulk of Merritt’s firefighting personnel, such as areas for storage, and a training room.
“I think the biggest thing is that our service has changed so much,” said Tomkinson. “Our call volume is nearing 700 calls per year. So it’s getting busier, and we’re offering a greater level of service to our community.”
Tomkinson added that based on the response time analysis done by the fire department, another station could be added on the bench — but current population numbers wouldn’t be able to support two fire halls in town.
The city’s budget process continues this weekend, as council will meet for a Committee of the Whole meeting in council chambers at 8 a.m. on Saturday, Feb. 25.
