ST. CLOUD, Fla. – A new fire station is poised to significantly boost emergency response times for people who live in one of the fastest-growing cities in Florida.
News 6 covered the groundbreaking ceremony for St. Cloud’s Fire Station 34 in September. Nearly a year later, the $1.6 million facility on Nora Tyson Road is officially operational with a staff of 18 first responders. It’s the city’s fourth fire station.
Mayor Nathan Blackwell highlighted that the station’s opening marks a crucial improvement for accommodating the expanding population on the east side of the city.
“One of the primary purposes of city government is to provide for the safety and care of our citizens,” Blackwell explained. “That’s why this station was built because there’s been such exponential growth in our city.”
St. Cloud Fire Chief Jason Miller added, “We literally moved the crew 3.5 miles from the other station downtown to provide coverage to an area that didn’t have any. As far as an actual response time, I couldn’t hazard a guess, but I can imagine that it’s going to be significant.”
The population of St. Cloud has surged, with projections from the U.S. Census indicating more than 68,000 people now call it home, nearly doubling since 2010.
One of the fastest-growing areas is in the city’s southern edge near the Turnpike where the Crossprairie community is planning more than 5,000 new homes. To meet the growth, Station 32 on Old Canoe Creek Road will soon undergo a significant expansion, including increasing from two bays to four.
City leaders are planning another new station on the west side near the emerging Tohoqua community along Neptune Road.
“We’re anticipating, with council’s approval, that we’ll two fire stations under construction at the same time,” Miller said.
Currently employing around 100 firefighters, St. Cloud anticipates the need for additional staff as the community continues its population boom.
“That’s always a challenge in Central Florida,” Miller explained. “We’ve gone through some very creative means of recruiting firefighters up to and including hiring firefighters as trainees and sending them to school ourselves.”
“We are trying to do the best job possible to take care of them financially, so that it is attractive to want to come here,” Blackwell added. “We want to take care of all of our first responders as best as we possibly can.”
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