By Reid Forgrave
The Cincinnati Enquirer

MONFORT HEIGHTS - A fire station to be built next year off West Fork Road will be the third Green Township fire station since 2000 that either underwent major renovation or was built.

Township fire officials and administrators say this will help alleviate one of the most pressing concerns in this growing west side community, one of the state's largest townships.

The department responds to 20-24 calls a day for fire or emergency services, and that is increasing at a rate of about 4 percent a year, said assistant fire chief Thomas P. Kotte.

Now that all four fire stations in the township are up to date, Kotte says, the fire department can focus on hiring more staff.

Fire department staffing has become an issue, and the three candidates for Green Township trustee agreed during a recent forum that police and fire staffing is an urgent concern.

"We really do need more firefighters, especially with our run volume increasing," Kotte said. "I want to be able to take care of staffing before something big happens and makes people really realize the problem."

The new $1.5 million, 8,800-square-foot building on Audro Drive is in one of the township's booming areas, Kotte said, and will serve much of the Monfort Heights and White Oak neighborhoods. The current building, nearly 50 years old, will be demolished starting in spring, with construction to be completed in fall 2004.

A new fire station on Bridgetown Road was built in 2000 at a cost of $1.4 million, and the Covedale fire station on Sylved Lane was rebuilt in 2001 for $850,000.

Township officials say this makes the township's entire fire department state-of-the-art.

"We want to build a firehouse that, 50 years from now, people say it's a very usable structure, very attractive, and very effective for the firefighters and EMS personnel who use it," said Kevin Celarek, Green Township administrator. "They built Riverfront Stadium and they knocked it down 32 years later. We don't want that. We want to be using this 50 or 100 years down the road."

E-mail rforgrave@enquirer.com