Fire Dept

 The Safety Center for Jackson Township was dedicated June 8, 2003. Until 1952, Township residents contracted with municipalities closest to their neighborhoods to provide fire protection. In that year, a meeting was to be held to organize an all-volunteer Fire Department for Jackson Township. In 1953, the department began responding to calls from Township residents- the department answered 37 calls in its first full year of operation. Volunteer firefighters were paid $1.00 a year

On December 30th, 1953, the lake cable recreation association sold two building lots to the Township for $1, for the purpose of the building a fire station. (A proviso in the deed stipulated that the land would revert to the lake cable association if and when it was no longer used as a fire station. )

Fire Station No. 1 was built entirely through community donations - the first levy to support the fire department was passed in 1971. The levy was for one mill.

Fire station No. 2 was built in 1960 on Traphagen St, and two other stations, one at the Wales- Strausser intersection and the other in the Belden Village area, were added in 1971.

By the early 1970s, the Township had grown in population and residential and commercial development, and the fire department was responding to more fire an emergency calls. In 1970, firefighters answered more than 300 calls, more than double the figure from just five years before

In 1972, six paid firefighters were hired to assist the 80-member all-volunteer department. Professional firefighters worked the day shift, the time when most of the volunteers were at work and might not be able to answer fire calls.

The 5th station has been built on hills and Dales, and to keep up with the residential growth, The township's fire department answered about 4000 calls per year and 2003.

The safety service building now houses fire station No.1 as well as the administrative offices for the department. The facility also provides a new home for the Police Department, which had outgrown its headquarters on Fulton road, a building that was once a grocery store and was not designed to house a police force. The building, located at the center of the Township, is almost 52,000 square feet but provides room for growth in each department. Funding for construction of the new building came from estate tax funds.