PORT ANGELES — Clallam Fire District No. 2 officials plan to move their administrative offices to new quarters at 1212 E. First St., vacating facilities shared with the city fire department.
Fire District No. 2 Chief Sam Phillips said that following the successful purchase and renovation of the new offices, which once housed a bank, the fire district will move out of the facility it has shared since 2008 with Port Angeles Fire Department at 102 E. Fifth St.
The property the fire district is purchasing is zoned for an ambulance, he said, but the fire district has no plans to house an ambulance or fire apparatus at the site.
No move-in date has yet been set, and Phillips did not have an expected date for the finalization of the purchase.
The First Street building has 5,180 square feet and until about a year ago, housed a Union Bank. Before that, it was a Northwestern National Bank branch. The fire district will pay about $410,000 for the building.
Phillips said the fire district could have paid for the building out of its finance reserves, but rather than deplete that balance, it decided to go with a limited tax general obligation bond through the firm of K & L Gates of Seattle.
The bonds will carry an interest rate of 2.65 percent and cost the fire district about $23,000 a year.
The district plans to pay for that out of current budgetary funds and does not have plans to ask voters for an additional tax levy.
Phillips noted that building a new office facility would have probably cost much more and required a public bond vote.
Decision to separate
The fire district commissioners’ decision to purchase a new facility grew out of notification in October 2015 that they needed to vacate offices shared with the city fire department.
Port Angeles Fire Chief Ken Dubuc notified the district that the city wanted to modify an interlocal agreement that allowed for shared facilities and asked that the fire district vacate its offices.
The sharing dated back to 2008, when both the fire district and the city department considered consolidating into a regional fire authority. In late 2011, following an election, change of personnel and a financial recommendation against it, the effort ended.
Phillips said that former Port Angeles finance director Yvonne Ziomkowski, currently embroiled in a sex discrimination case against the city, at the time recommended against the consolidation out of a concern that the city would lose some funding.
Since then, the two fire entities have shared offices at the city facility. The fire district has hosted some shared city fire department apparatus in one of its stations.
The problem, said Dubuc, is that efforts to consolidate and blur the lines between the district and the department created other problems — namely, residents were not sure who served their communities.
“It was confusing for volunteers, too,” said Dubuc, as they were not sure to whom they answered.
In the end, Dubuc feels the separation will be a “positive thing” for both departments and should allow the fire district to develop its own identity.
For its part, the city department plans to utilize the three offices to be emptied as an emergency backup facility for city hall operations.
Phillips said the district evaluated other sites in addition to the one on First Street. Some were more expensive while others were in poor condition, he said. Others had no parking.
He said officials looked at a “promising” property on Prospect Place but it was determined to be in a seismic hazard zone. The soil was found to be prone to liquefaction during earthquakes and public agencies are prohibited from using such sites.
Some renovations of the former bank building will be required, including taking out the counters and teller service stations.
Most of the work will entail wiring for the district’s information technology.
The First Street site also has a basement will allow the district to store years of records, training materials and some equipment.
Phillips said the district might decide to lease some of the handicapped-accessible building out to non-governmental organizations or nonprofits in the future. In the short term, the district plans to host its own meetings and some first aid training there.
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Assistant Managing Editor Mark Swanson can be reached at 360-452-2345, ext. 55450, or mswanson@peninsuladailynews.com.
