Police

Manorville FD eyes substation near EPCAL

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While the Riverhead Volunteer Ambulance Corps considers expanding its presence in the Calverton area, Manorville Fire Department is thinking about doing the same thing.

While Grumman occupied the EPCAL site from 1954 to 1995, it had its own fire department on site. After Grumman left, the local fire districts assumed responsibility.

Though the hamlet is covered by one ambulance service — RVAC — Calverton is split so it’s technically covered by three fire districts: Riverhead, Manorville and Wading River.

“We want something where we’ll throw a little station up there and we’ll staff it and protect our area. The idea of a combined station, logistically, is not feasible,” said Manorville Fire District Commissioner Wiliam Hille in an interview Saturday.

In addition to considering a plot inside the industrial park — near the northeastern corner of the first district — the Manorville Fire District also has looked at the abandoned office buildings on the south side of Grumman Boulevard, west of the Swan Lake golf course. That land is privately owned but has been vacant for years.

The bulk of EPCAL is covered by the Manorville Fire District, but the northern 500 feet off Route 25 is covered by the Wading River district.

There’s also a small section on the eastern part of the property within the Riverhead Fire District, although its mostly undeveloped.

Mr. Hille said his department gets called to EPCAL a lot for automatic alarms at the businesses there. “Almost all of the buildings there are in our district,” he said.

Last Thursday, Town Board members said another possibility would be to break up EPCAL — the 2,400-acre town-owned property that’s been is in development stage — into three two-acre parcels, with one being made available for each of the three fire districts so they could build their own substation. A third option would be to move the boundary lines of the fire districts, but the recently-released EPCAL redevelopment plan indicates that the fire districts have opposed than plan.

Riverhead Town took ownership of most of EPCAL in 1998.

Manorville Fire Department’s headquarters is located on Silas Carter Road with  substations in Manor Park and off County Road 111.

News Review file photo.

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