Martin City Board approves $11.3 million loan for new police station, library & fire station

MARTIN, Tenn. — One local community is expanding after their city board approves a multi-million dollar loan to improve the city.

The Martin City Board unanimously approved an $11.3 million loan Monday night to add a new police station, library and finish renovations on a new fire station.

“They’re called grant loans from Rural Development because they are low interest rates over a long period of time,” Mayor Randy Brundige said.

The loan will be divided among the three projects, and building a new police station is at the top of the list, moving to the north end of town.

“But this building is very old, and we really do need a new facility,” Police Chief Don Teal said. “The community and the citizens of Martin deserve that as far as law enforcement goes, and the improved services that we hope that it will provide for us and the community.”

Replacing the current police station will be a new library. The mayor said they want to develop downtown to be able to keep up with technology.

“In today’s time you have maker spaces, you have YouTube spaces where you shoot videos,” Mayor Brundige said. “We want something that will encourage people to be interactive in the community.”

The Martin Fire Department was given a little more than $1.3 million to add a third fire station in the west ward of the city, which will help them cut their response time significantly.

“This is going to be in actually University Plaza, which is a shopping complex. We are re-purposing a vacant building that was in the city,” Fire Chief Jamie Summers said.

The mayor said they hope to break ground on the new police station in May and that they should be able to finish the fire station at the same time.

The library project will start after the new police station is complete.