Sandra Davis has lived in South Cumminsville for more than three decades. She says explosions from the nearby Cincinnati Fire training grounds along the Mill Creek used to shake her house. Some of her neighbors, including educators at Ethel M. Taylor Elementary School just 700 feet away, have concerns about air quality on burn days.
Davis also wonders how the facility affects property values, especially with a $13 million expansion coming.
"I understand the importance of the fire training facility," she says. "And it's really great that it's a regional training facility — they're able to help other fire departments — I just want it to be safe for the fire fighters as well as the community because we're here ongoing."
Davis and other residents of South Cumminsville, Millvale and North Fairmount gathered June 29 at the school for a listening session organized by environmental nonprofit Green Umbrella and the Cincinnati NAACP. Officials from the Cincinnati Fire Department also attended to hear concerns and share information about future plans for the training facility's expansion.
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Interim Fire Chief Steven Breitfelder says the facility is "absolutely essential" and can't be located elsewhere, though he understands residents' concerns. In the past, the department has adjusted its schedule to shorten the amount of time it's actively burning material. The department also alerts the elementary school on days with live fire training so the school can shut off its HVAC intakes while burning is happening.
Breitfelder says the training fires only include "Class A" material like wood and paper you'd find in the average campfire. He says those burns won't increase with the coming training facility, which will be classroom and indoor training space unrelated to live fire exercises. Those spaces — including expanded places for women who are firefighters or recruits to change into and out of their gear — are necessary to relieve current crowded conditions and to continue diversifying the fire department.
"Though we're building this big training facility, it's not going to really increase any of the live burns or anything we're doing down there currently," he says.
Officials with the department also say bomb detonations at the site are rare,happening maybe once a year these days. They do acknowledge smaller gunshot-like sounds occasionally happen as part of investigations into suspicious packages and other items. Those excercises sometimes use shotgun shells that contain water instead of pellets.
Still, residents are concerned about noise and air quality impacts, especially for seniors who might not get alerts about the burns. Green Umbrella Climate Action Coordinator Tyeisha Cole, who grew up in Millvale, says those are part of more systemic environmental justice issues in the area. Millvale and surrounding communities are predominantly Black, with a history of disinvestment and industrial pollution. Cole is also chair of the Cincinnati NAACP's Environmental Climate Justice Committee.
"What we want to focus on are win-win solutions, like investing in climate resilience adaptation strategies," she says.
She'd like to see federally-funded air quality and noise mitigation efforts in the area around the training facility, as well as the surrounding neighborhoods as a whole.
Breitfelder said the department will try to do more to notify residents on days when burns are taking place. Residents at the June 29 listening session asked if those notifications could be sent the day prior to training days. Breitfelder said he thinks that is possible.
Some residents felt frustration with the fact they've been expressing the same worries about smoke and explosions for years. However, Davis says she was encouraged by the fact the department came to listen.
"I was really glad to see they have concern and some investment in the area," she said.