2 December, 1988 (~estimated)

Committee will help establish firehouse

An eight-member Joint Committee on Firehouse Relocation was appointed by resolution of the Princeton Borough Council and Township Committee Monday. The committee will help establish the new firehouse. to be constructed on a municipal parking lot next to the Valley Road Building.

Members of the committee arc Mark Freda and Thomas Poole. borough and township fire commissioners; Richard McKee, chief of the Princeton Fire Department; Eric Karch, chief of Mercer Engine Co. No. 3; Marvin Reed. president of Borough Council; Phyllis Marchand. deputy mayor of the township: Mark S. Gordon. borough administrator; and James Pascal, township administrator.

The committee will make recommendations to the Borough Council and the Township Committee concerning the method of financing the proposed firehouse; the system of ownership of the new building and the land upon which it would be located; the procedure for interviewing, selecting, contracting and overseeing an architect to design the new building, and the procedure for selecting, contractors.

Recommendations should be in as soon as feasible, and no later than the time of joint review of 1989 operating budgets and capital requests for the fire department, according to the resolution.

The new firehouse, expected to cost $1.8 million, would house Mercer Engine Company No. 3, which would move out of the Chambers Street station. The move expected to improve response time, which was hindered by traffic congestion and illegal parking on Chambers Street.