Our staff is currently working hard to put together FIRE CHIEF's November issue, which will include the 2006 Station Style Design Awards portfolio. The 65 pages of station designs will include a broad range of buildings, from career department headquarters and satellite stations to a full-range of volunteer department facilities and some unique renovation projects. The sharing of fire stations with other local government agencies is also interesting.

By the way, some of these stations will be featured in our new 2007 Station Style wall calendar, which will be included with every copy of FIRE CHIEF's December issue. The stations included so far in the calendar represent a good cross-section of facilities in use today.

Every year when we review the Station Style entries, we're reminded that the costs for a new facility can escalate easily and are particularly tough on volunteer departments. Sorting the wants from the needs is difficult, and finding money for new stations takes creativity and hard work in any department.

One interesting fund-raising project is in the community of Bird-in-Hand in East Lampeter Township, Pa. Deputy Chief Lonnie Kauffman of the Hand-in-Hand Fire Company, staffed mostly by Amish firefighters, wrote to us about how they set about raising funds to renovate their 30-year-old fire station.

The fire company officials gathered local business leaders and asked their advice about how to raise the $900,000 needed to renovate the old fire hall. "Several businessmen stepped forward and provided a fund-raising project: a fundraiser house in Bird-in-Hand," wrote Kauffman.

A one-acre lot, valued at $80,000, was donated, and the fire company spent a year soliciting additional help from local businesses. According to James Martin, president of the fire company, more than 65 contractors in their response area have donated services or products to build the house. In the brochure soliciting proposed donations, options ranged from excavation ($10,000) and framing labor ($7,500) to a cupola with weathervane ($700) and sump pit and piping ($200).

The fire company has invested about $90,000 in the house, which is valued at $450,000 and currently is for sale. The proceeds from the sale will go toward the new Hand-in-Hand Fire Company fire hall.

The new house that stands on Enterprise Drive in the village of Bird-in-Hand is a tribute to the Hand-in-Hand Fire Company and the surrounding community. "The project has met with great success," said Kauffman, "no doubt due to the inherent, strong sense of community, of teamwork and of helping others that has been a part of this area for decades and decades."

The fire company hopes to start building its fire hall within a year, after modifying the original plans, which are now two years old. Hopefully, the Hand-in-Hand Fire Company's new fire hall will be included in future Station Style Design Awards issue of FIRE CHIEF.