By Bonnie Culverhouse
Minden City Council voted unanimously Monday to property at 636 Shreveport Road/Highway 80 that will hopefully lead to a new fire station for the people and businesses in that area.
The City would purchase acreage behind Minden Steam Plant, facing Shreveport Road and bordering property already owned by the City. It houses Shorty’s Resale and a car wash.
Mayor Nick Cox said Newt Brown Contractor has agreed to sell the 7 acres at the appraised value of $250,000.
“He wants to sell it, but he doesn’t want to sell it like it is,” Cox said. “He wants to clean it up by tearing down Shorty’s and the car wash, then sell it to us.”
Cox negotiated with Gary Brown and set a clean-up price of $15,000 for the land and structures.
“Him tearing it down versus us tearing it down will save us a lot of money,” Cox said.
Building Official Brent Cooley agreed, “Fifteen grand to take both those places down is a deal.”
Cox said the plan is to pursue a grant to build a brand new fire station on Shreveport Road.
“There’s an opportunity to pursue some viable money,” he said. “That would give fire protection on that side of town – that side of the railroad tracks and fire protection to the biggest industry in the parish (Fibrebond, now owned by Eaton Corporation), and it would bring a new fresh presence to Shreveport Road which it hasn’t had in a while. We can go to the funding source and tell them we have the property and have desire to build a new fire department.”
Fire Chief Brian Williams said the City once discussed taking the defunct North Middle Landing fire station and bringing it back to life.
“Through discussions, we decided that just wasn’t feasible,” Williams said. “This location will be so much better because it gives us entrance to a major thoroughfare into our city.
“Initially we were looking at remodeling the old fire station and thankfully, the mayor and council approved the property to build a new one,” he continued. “I think we’ve realized through talks, remodeling and rehabilitating the old one is not as feasible as the city purchasing this new property.”
Opening a fire department there has been one of Williams’ strategic plans since he was hired as chief.
“Hopefully, this will be a catalyst for the revitalization of the west side of town,” he added.
Williams pointed out that several times in the past, including recent years, the department has attempted to respond to fires on the west side, only to be blocked by trains across Shreveport Road/Highway 80.
“Thankfully, in all instances I’ve known of, they were able to reroute down Bayou to get to the fire, but it was a little bit of a delay,” he said. “Not only that, when the city responds to assist outside our neighboring fire districts, such as Fire District 7 (Dixie Inn), or anything on the Interstate, it also creates a delay. If we have a fire station over there, it will be closer to assisting other agencies.”
But the main reason for the station, is to have faster service and protection for the citizens that live on that side of the tracks, he said, also mentioning the Fibrebond location and the fire that destroyed most of that business more than 25 years ago.
The new location for that fire station is a good one, Williams said, and the sharp curve should not cause problems considering design of the building.
“As long as we build it to the farthest west side of the lot, we have enough distance on approaching traffic – we can see clearly,” he said. “That’s a better and safer access location than the one on North Middle Landing where you are coming down (to Shreveport Road) and you have a building that blocks your view.”