Back on Saturday, Jan. 11th the Garretson Volunteer Fire department had their Annual Banquet. Tad Heitkamp was re-elected as the Fire Chief with Todd Fink as 1st Deputy Fire Chief and Levi Schmid 2nd Deputy Fire Chief. Ryan Longhenry will serve as treasurer and Marcus Staeffler as secretary. Their truck captain this year is Mark Rozeboom and training officers are John Shape and Jason Janssen.
“As of right now we’ve got 28 department members,” said Chief Heitkamp. “Two are going through EMT Certificaiton and two are going through Firefighter 1 and Firefighter 2 certifications. Out of our 28 members, we have a combined years of service pool of 356 years, a very impressive level of experience and skill.”
Chief Heitkamp relayed that as of this past city council meeting, they’ve concluded the real estate purchase agreement for the property on Dows Street and Center Ave., which is the first step in the process of getting that land prepped for the future construction of a new fire hall.
“Soon we’ll be going through the start of the bidding and grant processes,” Heitkamp said. “It’s a process that will take two to three years perhaps before we have a new fire hall, but of course we’re excited to get the process started.”
Above, receiving honors as firefighter of the year for 2024 was Dante Tezza (left). Kirby Lowe (right) of Lowe’s Construction was the 2024 Business of the year.
