NEW FIRE STATION TO OPEN AT SNOQUAMLIE PASS JULY 16!

Grand Opening - July 16, 2011

Years in the making, Fire Station 291 at Snoqualmie Pass has a new home in large part to a Land Conveyance Act and Grant.  Both were brought about by the station’s Fire Commissioners and it’s Fire Chief and fully supported by the community of Snoqualmie Pass. 

Since the mid 1990’s, Snoqualmie Pass Fire and Rescue has been actively seeking locations to build a new fire station, to the extent that a volunteer fire department can spend time on such an enormous task.    In early 2000 a group of Snoqualmie Pass citizens began to explore the idea of relocating the Fire Station.

Over the next few years several parcels of land were considered but for one reason or another, cost being the biggest factor, were rejected.  Through a series of discussions with the Forest Service, the Fire Department learned that there was a parcel of Forest Service land that would allow a new station to be built with less impact to current operations, and allow for better response times to the community it serves (which also includes the Summit At Snoqualmie Ski Areas in winter and I-90 year round).

HR1285, introduced in 2007, would convey 3 acres of Forest Service Land to the Fire Department.  On July 23, 2007,  HR1285 was passed by the House of Representatives with the modification that reduced the size of the footprint from 3.0 acres to 1.5 acres.  On January 15, 2009,  the Snoqualmie Pass Land Conveyance Act passed the United States Senate and was signed into law by President Barack Obama.

After the land was acquired,  funding for building the new Fire Station was received via a grant under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) which is part of the Obama stimulus package.  In the initial phase only 40 grants were given across the country to help build fire stations and Snoqualmie Pass was blessed to be one of them.  In fact, Snoqualmie Pass Fire & Rescue had the 3rd largest grant at just over $4 million.