A major addition came to the Portage Fire Hall in 2016. One that Fire Chief Phil Carpenter says has helped response times.

The addition increased the size of the space at the fire hall, and also included the installation of a heating system and brought a new training room. Carpenter says the work was a long time coming, the department was glad to finally see the project go ahead this past year. He says the increased space has allowed them to strategically re-position trucks and equipment.

"...It's in a more ready-to-go fashion," Carpenter says. "In the more space that's there, our firefighters are able to jump in the trucks and just respond accordingly."

The new training room was a welcome change for firefighters, too, Carpenter says. They used to have to move trucks out of the bay to create a temporary training space.

"That wasn't too bad in the summer time. But in the winter time you can well imagine (the challenge) when it's -30 C," Carpenter explains. "We were pulling trucks out, and letting them run so they don't freeze up and then heating the training space up."

"It was something we lived with for a lot of years so we're going to really enjoy that."