Study stalls $5 million Port firehouse project

Port Washington won’t move ahead with the design of a new $5 million firehouse — at least for the time being, the Police and Fire Commission learned last week.

“It’s still in the works,” Ald. Dan Benning assured commission members June 8. But, he added, the design probably won’t move ahead until a study on shared fire and emergency medical services has progressed.

That study, approved by the Common Council last week, is expected to be wrapped up by the end of the year, Benning said.

“It’ll give us some data that’ll be valuable,” he said. 

The study will be conducted by Wisconsin Policy Forum, which will keep the communities abreast of its progress. If it doesn’t look like shared or consolidated services make sense, the research firm will end the study, Benning said.

Seven other county municipalities — the cities of Cedarburg and Mequon, villages of Thiensville, Grafton, Saukville and Fredonia and Town of Cedarburg — have said they will participate in the study of shared services.

The $22,000 study will look at everything from call volume and personnel data to budgets and equipment and make recommendations on ways to potentially share services or consolidate operations, including ways to implement the recommendations.

The cost of the study will be split between the participating communities.

The study was spurred in large part by a realization that the current volunteer system is unsustainable, officials said, adding the hope is that by sharing or consolidating services the communities might realize better services at an equal or lower cost.

Benning told the commission that he believes any proposals from the study will probably take three to five years to implement.

“There’s a lot to be worked out,” he said. “And in the meantime, we still need to do something.”

Neither the Port nor Saukville fire stations have sleeping quarters where full-time staff could rest, he noted, and they don’t have facilities for women.

Port officials have been working on a plan to build a new west-side fire station on three to five acres of the former Schanen farm on the south side of Highway 33 just east of Jackson Road.

The proposed 15,000 to 20,000-square-foot station would include six drive-through apparatus bays, a training area, eight dorm rooms, male and female locker facilities, a secure emergency medical services supply room, a workout facility, kitchen and lounge, conference room and a training or meeting room that could double as a community room, according to a request for proposals for the design work.

Even though the City of Port owns the land and would provide water to the site, the Village of Saukville has the right to provide sewer service there. Officials have said that if they aren’t able to provide sewer service to the site, they may build the new facility with a holding tank.

A subcommittee has narrowed the field of five design firms to two companies that the Common Council will interview before choosing one.

The shared services study, Benning told the commission, “may reinforce we’re making the right call here.”

A new Port facility has the potential to become a hub for a shared or consolidated northern Ozaukee fire and EMS service, especially given its proximity to I-43, he said.

The design firms are being kept abreast of the study, he added.