Gilbert Fire & Rescue Department Chief Rob Duggan can tick off the many ways the department’s spaces are falling short of what is needed.
Store rooms are being used for offices. A truck bay converted into a workout room, where firefighters are exposed to diesel exhaust. Mechanics having to work on trucks outside in the heat, sometimes to the point of suffering heat-related illness. Not enough bedrooms in stations. Not enough showers for female firefighters.
“Essentially this station was built in 1999 and was not built with build-out in mind,” Duggan said while showing a picture of Station 4 to Gilbert Town Council members at a workshop this month. “We need to accommodate the today's needs of Gilbert, let alone in the future.”
To bring things up to par would cost an estimated $99.8 million over the next 10 years in the town’s estimation.
But no one on staff or council doubts their importance. Duggan casts the proposed package of projects as necessary to maintain service levels, protect people and the community and make an impact on the community.
He sums the need up as having “the right asset in the right place with the reliable vehicle, the proper training and equipment.”
Duggan said the fire department is looking to have a response time to calls of 4 minutes, 40 seconds or less. He can illustrate the importance in stories or just in the timeline of what typically happens in a house fire.
“When we arrive to a house fire, we try — if it's an active fire, a working fire — we try to stop that fire before it escapes the room of origin,” he said. “If we can stop it there, that'll protect everything else in the house. … If it breaches that compartment, extends to the attic and the rest of the house, now we're risking all the other contents inside. We can save the house oftentimes, but we might not be able to save what's inside because there’s been damage from heat, smoke and water.”
Four minutes, 40 seconds generally allows firefighters to keep the fire to that room of origin. But not long after, it grows worse.
“About the six-minute mark, it's going to start to breach the room, and it's going to start to impact the rest of the house,” Duggan said. “Eight or nine minutes, it's involved the entire house. ... We're going to lose all the contents in the house.”
With that as the backdrop, Duggan outlined for council five projects to bring facilities up to what is needed.
Fire administration remodel: $15.6 million
A recent emergency operations center remodel encroached into the fire administration space, Duggan said. That has pushed fire administration out to the Public Safety Training Facility, but that is not a long-term solution as that hinders training operations, which are the facility’s purpose.
The project’s scope is for a remodel of the remaining 5,000 square feet of the fire administration building and an addition of up to 5,000 square feet.
Coming technology is driving some of that need, as well, Duggan said. It could allow the building to support a tactical operations center during a major event, where things like firefighters’ locations and air levels can be tracked.
Station 4 remodel: $20.6 million
The station at 909 E. Ray Road is far too small for today’s Gilbert. Department data shows an ambulance and a hazmat unit should be there, but cannot be accommodated at the current station size of 5,162 square feet, two large apparatus bays and four bedrooms. Duggan said it needs to be 12,000-13,000 square feet with three to four large apparatus bays and 10 bedrooms.
Fire fleet building: $23.8 million
This goes to the reliable vehicle part of Duggan’s equation as the department tries to extend the life of its fire trucks. Ordering new trucks has become difficult and can require two to four years lead time in the current environment.
“This problem is not going to go away in three or four years,” Duggan said. “We're going to see issues related to supply chain and length of having to extend the life of apparatus probably at least for the next 10 years.”
But older trucks, particularly as they hit 15 or 16 years of age, have more maintenance issues, and the supply chain issues also affect the ability to get parts to maintain those vehicles.
Meanwhile, the current fleet building has only two open bays and inadequate parking, none of which is covered. That puts mechanics outside while working on some vehicles. Gilbert Fire has had to do 911 calls on its own employees working under those conditions.
“If it's raining that day, they're going to get wet,” Duggan said. “If it's 115 that day, it's going to be 115.”
Mayor Brigette Peterson and Vice Mayor Kathy Tilque said they would like to see this as a higher priority on the list given the conditions and that the building also serves the needs of the Public Works Department. But a new site has not been identified.
Six fire station renovations: $19.3 million
Duggan said this is where previous administrations missed the mark by just a little in estimating the needs of the future department.
Fire stations 2, 8, 6 and 5 each need to go from eight to 10 bedrooms, conversion of legacy locker rooms into individual bathrooms as the force adds more women and the addition of infrastructure to support additional apparatus.
Fire stations 1 and 3 do not need additional square footage but do need the conversion of locker rooms into individual bathrooms.
Fire Station 11 remodel: $20.5 million
Like other fire stations, this one at 2860 E. Riggs Road, Gilbert, calls for two additional bedrooms and conversion of the locker room into individual bathrooms. But it also calls for adding a dedicated fitness room, infrastructure for additional apparatus, a fuel station and shade. This remodel, however, will not be scheduled until fiscal year 2032-33 as the department looks to extend the life of stations before a remodel from 25 to 30 years, Duggan said.
As with some police department requests, Councilmember Jim Torgeson questioned the cost per square foot on some of the work.
But Duggan said it cannot be compared to building a home or a school, starting with the concrete for the floor.
“It has to be at least eight inches thick with a different substrate to support the heavy apparatus to get through,” he said. “Our buildings are built typically at a block with a lot of infrastructure related to technology and dispatch information. Bay doors are expensive. It's really an entirely different model than we might think of as a regular house. And also the pressure we put on for 24-7 operations is pretty significant.”
The workshop was a chance for council members to consider the town’s capital improvement priorities for police, fire and parks and recreation projects, plus how to fund those.
In a separate discussion, council members discussed the possibilities of a sales tax increase and/or bond to support some or all of the projects.
We would like to invite our readers to submit their civil comments, pro or con, on this issue. Email AZOpinions@iniusa.org. Tom Blodgett can be reached by email at tblodgett@iniusa.org or follow him @sp_blodgett on X.
Meet Tom Tom Blodgett joined Independent Newsmedia, Inc., USA, in 2022, when the company acquired Community Impact Newspaper's Phoenix-area properties. Raised in Arizona, he has spent more than 35 years in journalism in the state.
Community: He has served as an instructional professional in the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication since 2005, and is editorial adviser to The State Press, the university's independent student media outlet. He also is director of operations for an 18U girls fastpitch softball team from Gilbert.
Education: Arizona State University with a BS in Journalism.
Random Fact: He lived in Belgium during his freshman year of high school.
Hobbies: Tweeting enthusiastically about ASU softball (season-ticket holder) and grumpily about other local sports (pessimistic fan).
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