Bay City residents shocked by news of fire station closure

BAY CITY, MI – Residents were concerned and surprised by the news that one of the city’s four fire stations was closing Monday during a regularly scheduled city commission meeting.

The closure of Fire Station 5, 1209 E. Smith St., on Monday, July 15, leaves the city with two fire stations on the east bank of the Saginaw River and one on the city’s north bank.

The residents who raised concerns at Monday’s commission meeting lived in the Banks neighborhood, which stretches along Marquette Avenue from Ohio Street north to Harry S. Truman Parkway and no longer has a nearby fire station.

Resident Jilly Causley described news of the closure as a “surprise to all of us”.

“People there care,” she said. “We care about our families and our friends.”

The Bay City Department of Public Safety now has three fire stations located at 1401 Center Ave., 1000 Fremont St. and 212 S. Dean St.

In making the decision to close Station 5, Rowell said the department looked at neighboring communities that use three stations to cover larger areas.

Bay City’s plan for the future is to consolidate, meaning crews and apparatus assigned to Station 5 will now be assigned to Station 4.

Causley said she is concerned about response times for medical emergencies. The Banks neighborhood can be difficult to access without the use of bridges, which poses challenges in Bay City. The presence of rail traffic also poses the risk of emergency vehicles getting stuck behind trains.

“Station 4 might not reach us if there was a train,” she said. “We tell you this from experience. You can get stuck on the same train three times. I’ve done it before.”

Judy Brunner, another Banks District resident, expressed dissatisfaction with the lack of transparency surrounding the decision to close Station 5. Although a presentation was made by officials at a previous meeting, the closure date was not widely publicized.

“Although this decision was raised as a future possibility, the actual closure came as a complete shock to the majority of residents, as well as many of our elected officials,” she said.

Chris Girard, commissioner of the 6th arrondissement, said he was somewhat shocked by the news of the station’s impending closure. Referring to the presentation during which the closure was mentioned, he said he was not sure the closure would happen so quickly.

“We understand, I think, the need to repurpose equipment and things like that,” he said. “But this was just surprising.”

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