Hope Burns Eternal at Aging Station No. 2 in Montebello : Services: City leaders promised to rebuild the cockroach-infested firehouse in the 1960s. Decades later, a new station is in the works.

MONTEBELLO â€”  It was clear by the late 1960s that Engine Company No. 2, built in the final years of World War II, was no longer the gleaming firehouse that had been a source of pride to firefighters.

The red brick building was so small that some new firetrucks could not fit through the doors unless the firefighters folded in the rear-view mirrors. There was no heat or central air-conditioning. Three or four firefighters shared a tiny room next to the fire engine. And the place was infested with cockroaches.

City officials promised to remodel or rebuild Engine Company No. 2 in the 1960s, but nothing happened. In the late 1970s, south side residents were assured that a new fire station was all but built, but assurances were all that materialized.

In 1984, city leaders said the station would be demolished, prompting firefighters to move to a more spacious air-conditioned trailer in the station yard.

The firefighters are still living in the trailer today.

“I can remember when I got promoted in 1979, and the talk was that they were going to break ground,� Battalion Chief Eugene Chavez said. “It never happened. . . . It got to be kind of a joke. We’ve been rebuilding the station for 20 years.�

In late June, the City Council approved the plans and specifications for a $1.5-million project to level the old fire station and build a new one on the site at the corner of Greenwood Avenue and Date Street.

This time, “it’s going to happen,� Montebello Fire Chief Robert Fager said.

According to the plans, the new 9,300-square-foot station will be nine times larger than the current building. It will be capable of housing four trucks, up from the one paramedic engine housed there now, and it will include a Montebello Police Department community center, where residents can file reports or make complaints. There will be a dormitory for the firefighters, a kitchen, day room, equipment storage area and a dressing room and bathroom for female firefighters.

Engine Company No. 2 was the second of three stations built in Montebello in 1944, when the town was small enough that a neighbor’s tonsil operation or a Rotary Club meeting was enough to make front-page news in the weekly paper.

Since the mid-1970s, it has been occupied by paramedic firefighters, who respond to both fires and calls for medical aid.

It is the only station that does not have modern facilities, though sometime in the 1970s, firefighters who were tired of cramped quarters enclosed the porch and turned it into an office, built a bedroom for the captain right behind the fire engine and knocked out a wall between the kitchen and the day room to add more space.

But officials knew that sooner or later the building would have to be demolished. The remodeling raised concerns that the fire engine’s proximity to sleeping quarters might be hazardous. Unreinforced masonry also made the structure vulnerable to earthquake collapse.

“You can just look at it and see that it’s past its years of service,� Capt. Jerry Griffin said.

But city leaders said they did not have the money to replace or remodel the building before now. The station house, once a source of pride, became an example of what South Side residents call the bias city leadership shows favoring northern Montebellans.

During November’s election, South Side groups pointed out that while city leaders were saying they could not build a new fire station in the mid-1980s because there was no money, the council approved a $1-million parking lot expansion for a North Side disco.

Larry Salazar, who was a leader in a South Side organization, said residents are pleased that the new station soon will finally be built.

“We’ve been waiting a long time,� he said. “I guess it’s better late than never.�

Demolition crews knocked down an old house next to the trailer Monday to make room for the paramedic engine after the building is demolished. Chief Fager said construction of the new station should begin in early September and be completed in a year.