Your View — City needs well-planned fire station placement

Jay Kopischke, Mankato

May 21, 2008 12:19 am

— I am president of Mankato Professional Fire Fighters IAFF, Local 579.
Thanks to council member Vance Stuehrenberg for recognizing the importance of fire response.
In the May 6 paper, it was reported that Stuehrenberg said a new fire station in the downtown area would affect response times to the Hilltop areas. He is right.
Although Mankato Fire is in need of a new fire station, moving to the proposed site is not the solution.
In 2002, Mankato Fire was downsized, with the closing of Fire Station Two — significantly increasing the response time to West Mankato.
Although the proposed site would improve response to West Mankato, the new location would add several minutes of response time to the hilltop area.
The national response time recommendation is four minutes. Despite the devotion of effort the firefighters put forth, with minimal staffing and only two fire stations (one of which is staffed only at night), Mankato is only able to average five minutes, 15 seconds. The power of fire doubles every 30 seconds.
Can you afford to wait another minute? Imagine holding your breath in a smoke-filled house for five minutes.
Mankato is growing and needs well-planned fire station placement in addition to more full-time firefighters.