Aspinwall officials plan to repurpose a former fire station into an emergency shelter and community center.

When Aspinwall and Sharpsburg volunteer fire departments began to merge in 2022 into what would become Southern Allegheny Valley Emergency Services, leaders had to choose where to maintain operations and what services would no longer be required.

As merger plans continued and were ultimately approved by Allegheny County Courts in mid-2023, it was decided that the stations next to their respective borough buildings would be where crews would continue to be dispatched.

That made Aspinwall Fire Station No. 2 along 12th Street less necessary and just used for equipment storage, according to SAVES vice president Nick Scheid.

Borough leaders, including Mayor Joe Noro, had talks with emergency responders such as Foxwall EMS Chief Ben Shopland earlier this year about the station’s possible future. Severe spring storms made its purpose clear.

“We shot by our hip the last storm we had in April and used it as a cooling center and a power station for people to get power, charge phones (and) items like that,” said Ryan Santelli, borough emergency management coordinator and building and zoning officer. “I credit Joe for making this a permanent use for it. I think it’s a great idea. It’s perfect for the community and the area.”

Shopland said his team made great use of the station, and were able to reach people while public works crews in multiple municipalities worked to clear debris and thousands of Allegheny County residents went without power for days.

An ambulance can fit in the old station bays that once housed a fire truck and a rescue truck.

“During the big storms, we couldn’t get directly from our station in Fox Chapel into Aspinwall without going all the way around to Etna,” Shopland said. “We positioned a second truck down here until some of those trees were cleared and we had a way through.

“This was a great place to be able to put that truck indoors and have somewhere for the crew. Improving it (and) making it a more comfortable space will just enhance our ability to do that more often, and more proactively anytime there is some kind of an incident. … It’s still close enough to Fox Chapel that we could move our whole operation here temporarily if we needed to.”

Foxwall EMS has 32 staffers and 16 volunteers. The roster includes 25 EMTs, 19 paramedics, two advanced EMTs and two prehospital registered nurses.

The ambulance company responded to 263 calls in Aspinwall last year and is averaging about 25 calls in Aspinwall per month this year.

Shopland and Santelli were with Noro and borough manager Melissa O’Malley at the estimated 2,000-square-foot fire station on Oct. 28.

Borough engineer Dan Martone was on site with O’Malley the week before, evaluating potential upgrades.

The front two bays used to house a fire truck and a rescue truck. There is a meeting room, small kitchen area and a laundry room toward the back of the building.

Borough officials plan to improve comfort, accessibility and functionality by updating its heating and cooling system, renovating the kitchen to include a sink and a refrigerator, updating the existing bathroom and adding another bathroom, adding furniture and electrical outlets, applying new epoxy flooring and painting.

Estimated project costs have not yet been determined.

Santelli said minor electrical work is needed to make the building functional.

Some Americans with Disabilities Act-compliant upgrades are also included in shelter plans.

“It has the ramping, it has the right grade level,” he said. “It just needs basically the outlets. When we do the bathrooms, the bathrooms have to be ADA-compliant. Other than that, it’s got everything else it needs.”

Santelli sees the station getting more emergency use than the borough building because some outages in upper Aspinwall can be traced to problems in nearby Fox Chapel and may not impact the lower section of Aspinwall.

“People on the hill are really happy that we’re going to use this for this purpose,” Noro said. “We’re not using it for anything else. Why not repurpose it as an emergency management place?”

The mayor said it is possible to use it for community events, not just emergencies, once upgrades are completed.

“It will be something that’s opened up to the community,” Noro said. “We have large amounts of families up here.”

Aspinwall is in the process of applying for a state Local Share Account grant to remodel the station. No matching funds are required.

O’Malley said she is awaiting renovation estimates to plug into the grant application due by Nov. 30.

State Rep. Mandy Steele, D-Fox Chapel, has offered support to get the grant.

Scheid said he is happy to see the old station get some use.

“The borough doesn’t have an emergency shelter,” he said. “If I’m 80-some years old and don’t have the capability to get heat in my house, where do I go? There is no place. That’s not something that happens every day and it’s an emergency.”

The borough also uses the old station as a polling place during elections.

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