Elkridge Volunteer Fire Department Relocation Gets Boost from State

The state will pay an additional $500,000 to help relocate the , which lacks the space and staff needed to meet public safety needs in a growing community, Howard County Executive Ken Ulman announced Friday.

The funding, included in the Fiscal Year 2012 state budget approved by the General Assembly, is in addition to $1.2 million proposed for the fire house in the Fiscal Year 2012 Howard County budget, which is subject to county council approval.

Ulman said the state funding came in large part as a result of efforts by state Sen. Edward Kasemeyer, whose district includes the Elkridge area.

“Public safety is a top priority of my administration, and I’m grateful to Sen. Kasemeyer and all the members of the Howard County legislative delegation for recognizing this need and securing this important funding,” said Ulman in a press release.

Kasemeyer, chairman of the state Senate Budget and Taxation Committee, said the relocation project will help give Elkridge residents “first-class fire protection.”

The station on Old Washington Road was designed in 1942 and does not have enough space for modern equipment and adequate staffing.

Howard County Fire Chief William Goddard talked about the need for a new firehouse in a .

“This building is falling down around us, it’s very expensive to maintain [and] we can no longer purchase fire equipment to get in the building that meets national standards,” said Goddard. “We’re limited. We’re not going to be able to keep serving the community.”

 Goddard said emergency response times were in jeopardy.

Plans are under way to relocate the station to more than three acres along Bauman Drive at Montgomery Road.

“Being in the fire service myself for over 35 years, nothing makes me more proud than being able to help the Volunteer Fire Department in Elkridge,” Delegate James E. Malone Jr., who also represents the area, said Friday in the funding announcement.