Treasure Island gets funding for new public safety building

TREASURE ISLAND, Fla. — The city of Treasure Island has secured $2.5 million from the state for a new public safety facility, after Hurricane Helene destroyed the building that housed the city’s fire rescue and police departments in 2024.

Treasure Island Fire Rescue is temporarily working out of portable trailers. Officials say the former fire and police building, which was built in 1957, took on about 3 feet of water during Helene.

Mercedes Nelson-Palmer, a fire and life safety educator, has worked with Treasure Island Fire Rescue for five years.

“It’s been unique to try to make something your home again,” Nelson-Palmer said. “Especially in a fire department where this is our second home — mostly to our fire crew that had their boots on the ground.”

Parts of the former facility remain as they were left after the storm, with paperwork and furniture scattered inside.

“This was my office before the storms,” Fire Chief Trip Barrs said. “The water just came in at this level, and basically cartwheeled a lot of furniture, flooded out the filing cabinets and all that. So, total loss.”

The $2.5 million in state funding comes on top of last year’s $1.5 million in state appropriations for the project.

Barrs said the new facility will be slightly larger than the former building, with space laid out more efficiently for shared uses.

“We’re going to share some space, like fitness equipment rooms and office or storage,” Barrs said.

The new facility will be built just down the street from the current site. Barrs said state law requires the new building to meet Category 5 hurricane specifications, which will require a sturdier foundation, larger walls, and other upgrades.

The current plan calls for fire truck bays on the first floor, the fire station on the second floor, and the Treasure Island Police Department on the third floor.

“It’ll give our firefighters and police officers a resilient, stable place to work from,” Barrs said.

Members of the Treasure Island community also said the new facility is important for the city.

“It’s pretty dire, especially for a small community like this,” said Andrew Cook, a bartender at Britt’s Pizza.

For Nelson-Palmer, it would be a new place for her and her colleagues to call home.

“It’d be wonderful to have a new building,” she said. “We’d be able to do community education in there a little bit more. We’d be able to bring the public through that a little bit more.”

The new facility is in the design phase. Once the design is finished, it will be shared with the City Commission and the public.