Last week, the city of North Port cut the ribbon on their new Public Safety complex. The complex is merging blue and red lines by housing the North Port Police Department and North Port Fire Rescue.
North Port Fire Chief Scott Titus says every detail of the facility was planned for the longevity health and safety of the firefighters.
“The equipment room has it’s design for certain repetitive motion exercises that reduce injuries. Our wash areas where we wash anything that gets contaminated so they’re not cross contaminating and bringing those things home. There’s double vest bules to keep any contamination from bunker gear or exhaust from coming into the station,” said Titus.
Moving away from old school printers where tips used to come in, the common area has two technology boards that information is digitally displayed on.
“Its all GPS mapped and located and tied into our dispatch hub,” said Titus.
Not only does this help the firefighters with response time, but it also provides them more tools for training.
“They can look at videos and listen to audio calls, where there’s lessons to learn from other departments,” said Titus.
The motto of the station is proudly displayed in the kitchen. The chief said the words safe, compassionate and professional are behind everything they do.
Moving on to the police side, North Port PD Chief Todd Garrison says the space was initially going to be left as an empty shell for future growth.
“As we got into the final design stage we realized that we were already out of space so we needed to relocate our training division out here so we built that area out,” said Garrison.
The new training room will allow officers to incorporate real life simulations into their training.
“We’re doing virtual training out of there, wearing the VR head sets, it’s a space we didn’t have before and we’re really excited to implement that type of training here at the north port police department,” said Garrison.
Chief Garrison says he’s excited to be located in Wellen Park as the North Port area continues to develop.
“We know that the growth is coming. When the residents and citizens start moving here, we’re already here and established so we want to keep that relationship going,” said Garrison.
This partnership is not only between the city’s first responders. Sarasota County will also use the facility to house an ambulance and firefighters.