> ## Content Index > Fetch the complete content index at: https://www.evanscutchmorepress.com/llms.txt > Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further. # New Orleans Fire Department Opens Its First New Headquarters in More Than a Century - URL: https://www.evanscutchmorepress.com/new-orleans-fire-department-opens-its-first-new-headquarters-in-more-than-a-century/ - Published: 2026-09-01T00:42:12.000Z - Updated: 2026-09-01T00:42:12.000Z - Description: New Orleans cut the ribbon Monday on a new fire department headquarters at 401 City Park Avenue, moving the NOFD's central offices for the first time in more than a hundred years. The roughly $12 million project, a decade in the making, replaces the department's Decatur Street home. - Author: Kim M. Braud - Tags: News, NOFD, All Stories NEWS *The $12 million City Park Avenue facility consolidates the department's administration and adds a 24-hour operations center, ending more than a hundred years at the Decatur Street headquarters.* By Kim M. Braud | August 31, 2026 NEW ORLEANS - The New Orleans Fire Department opened its new headquarters at 401 City Park Avenue on Monday, relocating the department's central offices for the first time in more than a century. City officials cut the ribbon on the 20,075-square-foot building in a morning ceremony held in the facility's auditorium. Superintendent Roman Nelson told the audience that many of the police officers, firefighters and paramedics working in the city today once took their entrance exams in that same building. The new headquarters replaces the department's longtime home at 317 Decatur Street, where the NOFD had been based since 1914\. Nelson said the department was established in 1891 and had known essentially one headquarters for more than a hundred years. > **For the first time since 1914, the New Orleans Fire Department's headquarters has a new address.** The move was years in the making. Mayor Helena Moreno said planning and design began in 2016, and the project advanced through two construction phases, with groundbreakings on January 7, 2021, and June 22, 2023. "This project has been in the works since 2016, and I'm incredibly proud that we were finally able to get it done," Moreno said in the city's announcement of the opening. She described the day as the culmination of a decade of work and a major investment in the department and in public safety. ## What the new headquarters includes The City Park Avenue site was previously the city's municipal training academy. Councilmember Aimee McCarron, whose District A includes the corridor, said the property had sat blighted and covered in graffiti for years before the renovation. The renovated building serves as a consolidated administrative office and a 24-hour operations center, with offices for fire chiefs and executive staff and space for planning, inspection and administrative personnel. According to the city, it also houses a dedicated emergency operations center, sleeping quarters, a fitness area, a full kitchen and a laundry room. An adjoining annex provides training space, and a 500-kilowatt natural gas backup generator is intended to keep the building running during outages. Jerry Harris, director of the city's Capital Projects Administration, said the work included a complete replacement of the building's electrical and mechanical systems and a reconfiguration of the interior. Phase 2 construction totaled about $8.474 million, the city said, and the overall project, counting design, earlier phases and furnishings, came to roughly $12 million. Funding came from Community Development Block Grant funds, City of New Orleans bonds, FEMA Public Assistance and Hazard Mitigation Grant Program funds. ## Who spoke, and what happens to the old building Speakers at the ceremony included Moreno; Nelson; Michael Harrison, the deputy mayor of public safety; McCarron; District D Councilmember Eugene J. Green Jr.; Darrick Hesson of the New Orleans Office of Coordination and Emergency Management; and Harris. Harrison, a former New Orleans police superintendent, told the audience he had graduated from a police academy class in the same building in 1991\. Green said residents of his district were also glad to see the site restored. Nelson said the department has fully moved into the new headquarters, with only punch-list items remaining. Asked about the future of the Decatur Street property and Engine 29, which had operated from the old headquarters in the French Quarter, Nelson said there are no immediate plans to relocate Engine 29 and that the city is still evaluating uses for the building. The project team included NANO, LLC; Schrenk, Endom & Flanigan; Huseman & Associates; Vista Landscaping; Materials Management Group; NFT Group; and AOS Interior Environments, with Jennifer Lilos of Capital Projects Administration serving as project manager. --- *Kim M. Braud is the Founder & Editor of Evans Cutchmore Press, an independent newsroom covering Louisiana and the Gulf South. Her reporting focuses on government accountability, infrastructure, business, culture, and the public policies that shape communities.* *© 2026 Evans Cutchmore Press. All rights reserved.* --- [SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSROOM](https://www.evanscutchmorepress.com/subscribe/)