VISTA — Fire personnel at Vista Fire Station 3 along East Vista Way have a new, state-of-the-art building to call their home base, featuring upgrades that enable them to respond to emergencies more effectively and support their well-being.
Officials with the fire department, the city of Vista, and the Vista Fire Protection District, along with elected county and state officials, celebrated the grand opening of the new fire station on Monday morning.
Built in 1961 and remodeled in 1997, Station 3 is the oldest of the city’s six fire stations. It was demolished and rebuilt to accommodate more personnel (it can now house seven people instead of five), make general upgrades, and allow faster response times by reorienting the building so that fire trucks can exit onto East Vista Way rather than Old Taylor Street.
The station officially went into use in early April.
“I want to take the opportunity to thank you all for your investment in this home. This home, like others that are shaped and built like it, is a respite for the women and men that serve communities across this country, that put aside their personal challenges in order to protect the public,” said Vista Fire Chief Gerard Washington.
The new Station 3 features a homey kitchen area and day room, new dormitories, a gym, a three-door apparatus bay, and diamond plating for firefighters to practice rappelling.
“It’s quite the accomplishment,” said Deputy Fire Chief Robby Ford. “It has a lot of the technologies that a fire station needs — high-speed, roll-up doors, it has modern station alerting, a comfortable kitchen, individual dorms, individual bathrooms, a workout area, it houses some frontline equipment, it gives us the ability to house some reserve equipment.”
The new station will serve an area of approximately 10 square miles, including eastern Vista and portions of the Vista Fire Protection District, which lies outside the city limits to the east. This area contains around 22,000 people and 6,600 structures.
Assemblymember Tasha Boerner, who secured $5 million for the project in 2021 from the California Office of Emergency Services, said Fire Station 3 is crucial to protecting not only Vista but the wider county area.
“This was not only for Vista, it’s for the entire region,” Boerner said.
To recognize the new fire station, the Vista Fire Department received proclamations from Boerner and the offices of Rep. Mike Levin, state Sen. Catherine Blakespear, and Assemblymember Laurie Davies.
Additional funding included $4.5 million from the Vista Fire Protection District. VFPD President John Ploetz emphasized the importance of collaboration between the fire district and the city’s fire department, as fires in the area are most likely to start in the east.
He noted that fire safety should not be a political issue.
“There’s no other side to this issue. Nobody’s in favor of wildfires, nobody’s in favor of slow ambulance responses,” Ploetz said.
The address of the fire station was also changed to 1962 East Vista Way, to commemorate the birth year of late fire inspector Mike McFadden, who passed away in 2022 from skin cancer.
During the project, Fire Station 3 crews were temporarily relocated to a three-bedroom home owned by the Vista Unified School District around a mile and a half away. Fire department officials thanked the school district for their collaboration.
This is the fourth fire station in Vista to be built by Erickson Hall Construction.
“Every detail for a facility like this really, really matters,” said Nathan Miller, chief information officer with Erickson Hall. “We are absolutely proud of this community and this facility and the construction and everything it represents.”
Rather than the usual ribbon-cutting ceremony, officials participated in a hose uncoupling to celebrate the new station.
The ceremony also coincided with Chief Washington’s birthday, which fire personnel celebrated with cake and a song.
