LYNNFIELD — Voters on Tuesday approved the town’s proposed $63.5 million public safety building project, with 58 percent voting yes and 42 percent voting no.
The project calls for the demolition of the existing South Lynnfield Fire Station and for the construction of a new fire headquarters in its place as well as expansion and revocation of the existing police, fire and Town Hall facility.
“Thank you for supporting all of your public safety first responders. We appreciate the support and we’ll continue to serve,” said Lynnfield Fire Chief Glenn Davis.
Davis said the current facilities occupied by the town’s public safety departments were substandard, and it was imperative that voters approve the project.
“Number one deficiency is the cancer risk to all of our firefighters. Their turnout gear is stored on the apparatus floor with the apparatus, the equity for lack of facilities or space for any of our female firefighters, there’s no private spaces, no separation of sleeping quarters, or restrooms or shower space or any of the above,” Davis said.
The project sailed through November’s Town Meeting by a margin of 287-33.
The current station is also lacking accessibility for people with disabilities so they can’t be “present to the fire department for any services” they offer, he said.
“There’s a lot of deficiencies that exist and that’s why it’s so vitally important to do this project,” Davis said.
Town Administrator Rob Dolan said the town believes the project is needed to rectify “serious issues of health and safety for our police and fire personnel, equity for female officers as well as addressing space to accommodate the expanded scope of emergency responsibilities that our departments take on will all be addressed.”
Now that the project has been approved, Davis said there is a lot of work to do over the next few years to make the new station a reality.
“We already have a meeting scheduled tomorrow,” Davis said. “We need to hire a construction overall manager, we need to start figuring out temporary space for the time that construction is going on, a lot of hard work but hard work with a good outcome at the end of it.”
Construction is expected to begin sometime in 2024 with a completion date of 2026.
Emily Pauls can be reached at [email protected].
