By Ruby Pratka

Local Journalism Initiative

Since mid-June, the 50 firefighters of the Service de sécurité incendie de Bromont/Brigham/Saint-Alphonse de Granby have had a place to store equipment, rest and fix their meals between calls, and shower and clean equipment after calls. The long-awaited new fire station in Bromont held an open house last weekend and a formal ribbon cutting on June 25. The station was built at a cost of $12.1 million, with $4.6 million covered by a grant from the provincial government’s PRACIM program for environmentally friendly municipal infrastructure, Mayor Tatiana Contreras told the BCN. The towns of Brigham and Saint-Alphonse, which are also served by the Bromont fire department, paid a combined 26 per cent of the remaining cost, and Bromont financed the rest through a $7.5 million long-term loan. The money was first allocated in the city’s 2022 budget.

“The firefighters have been waiting for this for years,” said fire chief Jocelyn Danis, who was named fire chief two years ago, around the time construction began on the new building. “I wouldn’t even call the old fire station a fire station; it was more of a garage.” The closest thing to a break room in the old building, he said, was a worktable wedged between two fire trucks. The new facility has a break room with a kitchen, a dormitory, a workout room, changing rooms, offices and meeting rooms and a terrasse. It also has an equipment decontamination room, in line with new workplace health and safety norms around cancer prevention. Contreras said the central location of the fire station and the fact that the garage is on the premises will lead to improved response times.

Bromont is one of several municipalities in the region with new fire stations planned or under construction – the towns of Dunham, Frelighsburg and Brome Lake have all announced plans to open new fire stations in 2026, citing the opportunity for significant support from the province and the need to replace aging buildings and modernize decontamination procedures.

Danis said the June 21 open house was a “great event” that helped citizens young and old – and firefighters, who led guided tours – get to know the new building. “We do open doors as often as we can – it’s taxpayer money that paid for the building, so people have the right to come and see it. The kids played in the trucks and the adults visited the offices, and we talked to everyone about fire safety. It’s really important for us to keep that link with the population.”

MNA Isabelle Charest, Contreras, Brigham Mayor Philippe Dunn and Saint-Alphonse de Granby Mayor Marcel Gaudreau attended the formal inauguration on June 25. “This new fire station is the result of an exemplary intermunicipal agreement between the City of Bromont and the municipalities of Brigham and Saint-Alphonse-de-Granby,” Charest said. “I would like to commend the leadership of the City of Bromont, which has carried out this important project. Thanks to this collective effort, firefighters will benefit from a modern, safe and functional work environment, and the community will benefit from services better adapted to its needs.”

“It’s a great intermunicipal project – the safety of citizens is improved, and so is the safety of the [fire department] employees,” Contreras said. “Thanks to the government’s financial support … and the valuable collaboration of our partner towns, we are taking concrete action for the future.” Contreras said no decision had been made about what to do with the site of the former fire station.