Abigail Brone
The Hour, Norwalk, Conn.
(TNS)

Feb. 22—NORWALK — With the estimates for two new fire trucks coming in far over budget, the Norwalk Police Department offered up nearly $500,000 in surplus funds from the communication system upgrade to help cover the costs.

The Planning and Zoning Commission approved a special capital appropriation request from the fire department for $489,225 at a meeting Feb. 16, according to city documents.

The funds will cover the remaining balance to buy two new fire trucks, Norwalk budget director Tom Ellis said. Funds for the trucks will be transferred from excess police department money intended for a communications system upgrade.

• Approved Cost of Two Norwalk (CT) Fire Trucks Jumps 36% from Original Budget Request

Over the summer, it was revealed that a police department project to upgrade its communication system came in millions under budget.

“That project is moving along rather smoothly; they have not had to purchase all the new equipment that they anticipated several years back when they put in the request and they are expecting a significant underrun in that capital project,” Ellis said.

The communications console project has been in the works for several years and had an original anticipated cost of about $15 million.

In the 2020-21 fiscal year capital budget, the police department and combined dispatch received $13.5 million for a “communication console.” Deputy Police Chief Terry Blake previously confirmed the $5.6 million for the system will be taken from the $13.5 million capital appropriation.

With the excess funds, the fire department reached out to police, to determine whether they would share the surplus funds, Ellis said. The police department was cooperative and good partners throughout the agreement, he said.

“We came up with this idea to work with the police department to see how much they were going to underrun that communications project, ask them if they would be willing to transfer a portion of their remaining or unexpected surplus funds to the fire department to get this done,” Ellis said. “Even with this advancement, they’re still expected to underrun the project, so as challenging as the fire department run is in terms of supply chain issues and inflation, the police department run seems to be just the opposite.”

For the fiscal year 2021-22, the fire department submitted a capital budget request for two new pumpers, fire trucks that carry water, Norwalk Fire Chief Gino Gatto said.

“We were not awarded that one, so the following year we had to put in for two engines, which his (fiscal year) 2022-23. We were granted $1.35 million for purchase of two fire engines,” Gatto said. “I believed $675,000 was enough to cover both of them. Unfortunately, the specs were drawn up, we went out to bid, we received two bid responses from two different fire manufacturers.”

The two bids came in hundreds of thousands of dollars above the anticipated budget for the trucks, with the low bid of $1,839,225 from Pierce Manufacturing and a higher bid from another company for $2,092,337, Gatto said.

The $500,000 requested by the fire department will cover the difference between what was previously appropriated and the lowest bid amount, Gatto said.

Now, the police offered to put some of the unneeded communications system funds toward the fire trucks, Gatto said. Fire engine 3, located at the Van Zant Street station, and engine 5 at the Middle Street station will be replaced.

“The way we operate is we try to keep t

By Ed Ballam

For more than 70 years, Whelen Engineering has been an innovator in the warning systems business, manufacturing lights and sirens for everything from large tornado alert systems to lights for fire officers’ SUVs, cruisers, ambulances, and fire trucks. Scene lighting is a huge part of the business as well.

In recent years, Whelen has increasingly become more vertically integrated, able to produce virtually every component of the products it makes as well as even support its own facilities’ physical plant needs with on-staff heating and air-conditioning technicians and truck drivers to move products as needed.

That integration is a source of pride for Whelen and is completely intentional, explains Whelen’s CEO Geoff Marsh.

“We want to control all of the processes at all levels,” Marsh explains. “It’s our way of controlling our own destiny. When we rely on our own processes, we have far better quality control as well.”

Whelen Engineering, founded in 1952, is headquartered in Chester (CT), in a facility that’s about 200,000 square feet. A second, much larger facility is located in Charlestown (NH) on a 40-acre campus with six buildings totaling about 800,000 square feet. As of late fall, the company employed a total of 1,529 people, with about 800 of those located in Charlestown. Fire Apparatus & Emergency Equipment Editor Ed Ballam was given a VIP tour of that facility in November. Jerry Maslan, Whelen’s New Hampshire facilities manager, was the tour guide.

The Charlestown plant is buzzing with activity on an unseasonably warm early winter day. Maslan points out workers moving dirt for a small drainage project on the campus and says they’re Whelen employees. Shortly after, a 53-foot tractor-trailer truck pulls up the main driveway, emblazoned with a large red Whelen logo on the side of the box. At the wheel is another Whelen employee. Maslan says the company tries to do everything it can in house, part of the vertical integration philosophy that allows the company to be self-reliant and nimble when necessary.

• Why First Responders Can Count on Vertically Integrated American Manufacturers
• New Developments in Fire Scene Lighting
• Whelen Archives

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