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Progress continues on new Delavan fire station

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Delavan Fire Chief Neill Flood

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Photo by Terry Mayer

The new Delavan fire station is taking shape on Ann Street, just a block east of the current station. The department has been located on Seventh Street since 1983.

DELAVAN — Nobody’s happier than Neill Flood these days. That’s because his decades-long quest for a new fire station finally has turned from vision into concrete.

Ground was broken April 9 on the 16,000-square-foot, single-story station shortly after the Delavan City Council approved the project.

Construction is moving along quickly on Ann Street — only a block and a half east of the current station — and work is expected to be completed in mid-October.

Flood joined the volunteer Delavan Fire Department as a recruit in 1957 and became chief in 1983, so he knows all about patience. He said the long wait was because of one thing — financing.

“I was told many, many years ago that it would be two years because of the city’s debt structure ... And then about three years ago I continued to put more pressure on the council and city, and Mayor Mel (Nieuwenhuis) put together a task force to consider a new site,” Flood said. “We looked at a site across the street, but that was too expensive.

“I respect where they’re coming from, having to please taxpayers and maintain fiscal responsibility. You can’t just do something because of what 40 volunteers want. But, yes, it feels good because the new site will allow us to be so much more efficient.”

Now those struggles are a thing of the past.

The $2.31 million station will include offices for a chief, assistant chief, dispatcher and inspector; a conference room and training space. The building will feature a brick facade and glass bay doors. It has been designed so the training room can be used for evening community activities.

Read the full story in the e-edition of Walworth County Sunday, HERE.