Fire Chief Snags a Bargain on a Temporary Firehouse
By Sora O'Doherty
Moraga-Orinda Fire District firefighters will be sitting pretty in a $120,000 temporary building Fire Chief Stephen Healy obtained from Carmel Valley Fire Department for only $3,000.
The temporary building will be installed in the northern parking lot of St. Stephens Episcopal Church, around the corner from MOFD fire station 43, which will be demolished and rebuilt. The application for the work was approved by the Planning Commission on May 10.
The temporary structure should be in place by the end of June, and the new fire station is expected to be completed in one year, reopening in October of 2017, according to Healy. The temporary structure is 1,080 square feet, and has a detached, unenclosed apparatus bay for one fire truck. Although during the year that it takes to build the replacement permanent fire station, there will not be an ambulance on site. Healy pointed out that in the past two years, the ambulance from station 43 has only been called out once.
Plans for replacing station station 43 were approved by the planning commission first in September 2012, but the approval expired. The new permanent fire station is the same as was approved in 2012, but the temporary structure is now bigger, and located off site, only 450 feet away from the station.
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