It’s almost checkout time

Mathis Winkler

SANTA ANA HEIGHTS -- They’ll have to start making their beds again.

But Newport Beach firefighters who have responded to calls in the

airport area and Santa Ana Heights since late January from a base

comprised of a couple of rooms at the Radisson Hotel will get back a

kitchen and gym equipment once a new -- though still temporary -- fire

station is set up in the neighborhood.

City and Orange County officials are getting close to signing off on a

two-year lease agreement for land near Bristol Street.

Council members approved the $1 a year lease at their meeting Tuesday.

While the agreement still must be reviewed by lawyers, the county’s Board

of Supervisors is expected to approve the lease at its meeting Tuesday.

The station, which will include a double-wide trailer where

firefighters can eat, sleep and stay while on duty, as well as a canopy

or shell for the fire engine, could be set up as early as next week, city

officials said.

The makeshift hotel station was established after the county’s fire

station near the airport was damaged by fire in December and taken out of

service.

The closure caused response times to exceed a five-minute response

time goal.

While the proposed annexation of Santa Ana Heights -- expected to

happen by early 2002 -- would have brought a city fire station to the

area at a future date anyway, city officials decided to go ahead and set

up services now. At their Feb. 13 meeting, council members decided to

hire nine new firefighters and spend about $608,860 on the temporary

station.

Initial talks about leasing a section of a parking lot fell through

because the people in charge of the lot could not commit to a two-year

agreement.

As a result, city and county officials set their sights on three

connected pieces of land in Santa Ana Heights. While one of the lots sits

on Bristol Street, the other two open up to the corner of Zenith and

Orchid avenues.

On Feb. 26, city officials held a meeting in the neighborhood to give

residents a chance to review the proposal. The 15 people who attended the

meeting supported the idea as long as the firefighters would use Bristol

Street to enter and leave the station, and keep the use of the flashing

red lights and sirens to a minimum in the nearby residential areas, among

other things.

Once the city has annexed the area and has found a place to build a

permanent fire station, city officials said they’ll remove the temporary

station and return the parcels back to their original, vacant condition.