When you recall the fury that Katrina 

unleashed on this community, and the 

absolute above the call of duty your 

firefighters and police officers preformed.

This is a big event, a milestone for the city 

of Bay St. Louis. This is the first city building 

built by the city of Bay St. Louis to house 

city employees and city services since 

the old city hall was dedicated in 1905.

The building is not just a fire station, 

it’s also a first responder shelter. 

You have nearly 12,000 square feet hardened 

to provide near absolute protection during 

a tornado or hurricane event. This is what 

we call 361 standards. 

What does 361 standards mean, 

that’s a building that the structure integrity 

will withstand winds of up to 200 miles per hour. 

This project was designed to save lives 

and we can think of no 

higher calling than that.

Katrina demonstrated and other storms 

have demonstrated that our first responder 

community, they’re not gonna leave 

the citizens behind, so it was really critical 

that funding was allocated to make 

a safe place for them to stay, 

to ride out the storm.  

The Bay St. Louis fire station will serve 

as an example for many new fire stations 

throughout the country, especially those 

that are in harm’s way due to natural disasters.  

I’m here to tell all of you that 

you did a good job. I salute you for 

being persistent and making this most 

important project a reality. On behalf 

of mitigation, I thank all of you for 

allowing us the opportunity to partner with you.