If a hurricane blows through town, you're supposed to have enough supplies to survive the storm, but Gainesville Fire Rescue stations will be among those in the dark if the power goes out - at least for now.

G.F.R.'s fire stations do not have back-up emergency generators, so if they lose electricity, they'll have to rely on battery-powered radios and will have to manually open their garage doors during a storm.

Fire Chief Bill Northcutt says the department has had the generators on their wish list for many years, but they did not become a priority until after the rough hurricane season in 2004.

The generators were among the upgrades included in the Capital Improvement Plan for fiscal years 2009 through 2013 that city commissioners approved Thursday.

They will start to install them next year, and each station will have one by 2010, so this hurricane season, firefighters will once again be without them.

"Our station paging system has got a 24 hour battery back-up, so at the end of 24 hours, then we would be limited on our station paging to having to monitor radios. we also would be limited on how we could keep radio batteries powered up," said Northcutt.

The generators will cost the city 290-thousand dollars, all of which will come from interest that the city earned on money it had stowed away for other projects.

By David Hamilton/WCJB TV 20 News