The first new fire and emergency rescue station to be built in Montgomery County in more than 25 years will not open its doors until spring 2009, officials say, further delaying hopes of decreasing response time in the rapidly growing northern parts of the county.
County officials had hoped a new Germantown station would open this year, but construction issues are taking longer than expected to resolve. The last time the county opened a fire and emergency response station in a new community was in 1981, according to Fire Chief Tom Carr, when it debuted the one Germantown station that currently serves the city’s 90,000 residents plus people in Boyds and Clarksburg.
Construction of new fire and rescue stations has lagged behind growth in population, which jumpedfrom about 580,000 in 1980 to about 950,000 in 2007, according to census data. In 2000, the county approved the construction of six new stations, four in the upcounty area.
“The entire top half of our county doesn’t have enough fire stations,” Council President Mike Knapp said. “When master plans are done, they set aside planning for schools, not so much for fire stations, which creates a real challenge.”
Carr said he aims for fire and emergency response times that are within six minutes. In the northern areas, times can average about nine minutes, due to the distance first responders must travel. Some parts of the county are even worse, Carr said, such as Poolesville, where responses can take 20 minutes because the Barnesville station covers about 20 percent of the county’s geographic area.
The county did not have a fire chief until 2005, which affected countywide planning, Carr said, while other delays stem from the county playing catch-up.
“We’ve been building after the community has already moved in, and it’s tougher to find appropriate property,” Carr said.
Insurance agent Charlotte McDonald said she frequently deals with clients frustrated to be charged premiums that run $300 or $400 more a year to live in northern Montgomery County, because of the lack of a fire station within five miles.
“Some insurance companies wouldn’t even [solicit] these homes,” McDonald said. “If it takes 20 minutes for a truck to get to a house fire, the house could be halfway burned down.”
