Orange Village unveils designs for new fire station and police/city-hall renovation; bond expected in November

Mayor Judd Klein opened a packed community meeting by calling the project the village's biggest in 35 years and said officials intend to ask voters to approve public financing for a new fire station and a renovation of the existing police/city-hall building that would free space for a larger community center.

"This is the biggest project that we have taken on in 35 years as a community," Mayor Judd Klein said, framing the effort as both a public-safety and community-investment priority. He told residents the design team will complete schematic work soon and that the village will return with a cost estimate to set millage for a bond likely to appear on the November ballot.

Eric Prose, a project architect with DS Architecture, led the schematic presentation and said the proposed fire station site at the southwest corner of Harvard and Brainerd places public access on the north side while reserving the south side of the lot for rapid apparatus egress. "We're looking to landscape the site, make sure it fits into the context," Prose said, describing driveway geometry, a bypass lane for emergency apparatus and parking sized for shift changes.

Prose emphasized health-driven design choices for firefighters, describing a zoned plan that separates a 'hot' apparatus/decontamination area from transition spaces and green community or decompression zones. "Keeping that separate is key," he said, noting decontamination rooms, individual changing spaces, and dormitory separation to limit firefighter exposure to contaminants.

Police relocation and building reuse: Prose said the space vacated by the fire department would be reorganized to accommodate police functions and expanded community and administrative spaces. The design sketches show a secured sally port and larger evidence storage areas, flexible community rooms with a movable partition and a small kitchen for events.

Operational details and capacity: Police leadership said the plan accommodates the department's vehicles. "We have 10 marked and a few unmarked," the police representative stated when asked how many vehicles the station would house; the diagram discussed by the team included space for roughly 13 vehicle stalls. Fire department representatives said the current fleet includes two engines and multiple support and rescue vehicles.

Traffic, safety and studies: Multiple residents pressed for traffic analysis at the proposed fire-station egress onto Brainerd Road. Prose and the fire representative said preemption systems, a south-side exit and possible signal coordination would mitigate peak congestion and aid emergency response, but they acknowledged no formal traffic study has yet been completed for the site. "No traffic study has been done at this point," the fire representative said; officials said additional studies tied to nearby developments are forthcoming.

Costs, needs assessment and alternatives: Residents asked why leaders favored new construction over renovating the existing building. Mayor Klein said prior studies dating to 2016 and a subsequent cost-benefit review showed renovating the current facility would require an estimated $16,000,000 and still fall short of operational and safety needs. "The end of the day, the result was we would spend an awful lot of money for very little value," Klein said, adding that building a new fire station combined with targeted renovation was judged more cost-effective.

Community uses and revenue: The project would add a larger community room for meetings and events; council participants said draft rental fees discussed elsewhere have been set near $100 per booking and that officials plan to compare peer municipal rates before finalizing fees.

Next steps: Prose said the design team expects schematic design to finish within weeks before handing plans to quantity engineers for a firm construction estimate. Klein said the village will publish materials online, offer station tours for residents, and present the final estimate to determine the millage required for a November bond vote.

The meeting ended with an invitation to residents to tour current facilities and a pledge by officials to post the studies and cost information for public review.