After nine months of hard work, the Busby Fire Department’s new fire hall is officially in service.
The $150,000 project, explained Busby fire chief Jared Stitsen, has been a triumph of community spirit, bringing together resources from around the Westlock area.
“We held fundraisers, worked events, did highway cleanups,” he said.
“We’ve done everything to raise money for this. There were no dollars funded by the county for it. We saw the need and went ahead with it.
“People just came in to see how things were going and to drop off cash.”
Community members, Stitsen said, were just as integral in the building process as funding.
Much of the work done to raise the building’s walls was done by the men and women who will now man the station.
“The support from everyone has been amazing. I kind of relate this to an old barn raising. It’s just people coming out and getting it done. The help was in abundance through Busby,” Stitsen said.
“We had members from all across the county. We had members from the Town of Westlock Fire Department, guys from Fawcett, everywhere.”
Donations made up $90,000 of the overall cost of the 3,200 square foot building, while a $60,000 provincial community fundraising grant made up the shortfall.
The low price tag, Stitsen explained, would have been impossible without building material donations from local businesses and the hard work of volunteers.
Stitsen noted that Ted Dul, a Fawcett Fire Department captain, was also a driving force behind the hall’s construction, acting as foreman and lead planner throughout much of the nine-month project.
Dul, a veteran of the construction industry, shied from the praise but acknowledged the joy he took from the project.
“I gave them little baby steps in what to do and where to look for deals,” Dul said.
“I’ve been doing this for 55 years, so there’s nothing tough on a job for me. I had a brother who said that if you love what you’re doing, you don’t work a day in your life, which to me is the truth.
“It was quite a feat.”
Firefighters and volunteers on the project frequently worked long hours, well into the evening, fueled by food cooked locally.
“People would just show up. We didn’t have to worry about cooking. People would just show up with fancy meals — that’s what Busby is, right?” Stitsen said with a laugh.
“There’d be three to four people working there after work. People would work their day job and come to work four to six hours in the evening, working in the dark.”
On Saturday, May 28, nearly 100 people toured the new hall during a grand opening ceremony and barbecue.
Barrhead-Morinville-Westlock MLA Glenn van Dijken and Westlock County councillors were also on hand for the ceremony and to commemorate the opening.
