Hazleton, firefighters union exchange press releases, statements over staffing concerns
KAYLEE LINDENMUTH / SHENANDOAH SENTINEL FILE - The door decal of a Hazleton Fire Department truck.
HAZLETON – The city and its firefighters union have been engaged in a public dispute over staffing concerns in our area’s only paid fire department.
The Hazleton Fire Department is a combined paid-volunteer department which Mayor Jeff Cusat says is staffed by four platoons each of five paid firefighters, in addition to a contingent of volunteers.
“The Hazleton Fire Department has always been a combination department,” Cusat said in a press release. “This means that the paid career firefighters are manning the stations and tasked with getting all apparatus to the location of the emergency. At the scene, those apparatuses are met by other career firefighters, the volunteer firefighters, and the Fire Chief, where a situation is evaluated and whether additional requests are required for additional manpower.”
Hazleton’s paid firefighters are the nearest to Shenandoah.
Wilkes-Barre, Allentown, Reading, and Harrisburg all have paid departments, as do many of their suburbs.
The paid firefighters are represented by the International Association of Firefighters Local 507 union.
On Facebook, the IAFF has regularly raised concerns regarding the department’s staffing, noting incidents which were handled solely by on-duty career firefighters.
They added that the majority of volunteers respond to a handful of calls a year.
“As a result, it is common for only one volunteer firefighter to respond to an emergency call, and in many cases, no volunteers are immediately available,” they said in a Dec. 28 post. “This staffing shortage represents an ongoing safety concern—not only for career firefighters, but also for volunteer firefighters who respond to emergencies, and most importantly, for the residents and visitors of the City of Hazleton.”
“While the department is supplemented by volunteer firefighters—and we are grateful for their continued service—volunteerism is declining nationwide,” they added in a Dec. 16 post.
The union says there is a minimum of three firefighters on duty with a maximum of five and are asking the city to make five the minimum staffing.
President Shawn McArdle and Secretary Jordan Klein addressed Hazleton City Council on Dec. 16, requesting that they reopen the budget to make such a change.
Cusat, in a press release Monday responding to the Union’s statements, said the city plans to evaluate their request “while keeping in mind the City’s fiscal responsibility to the taxpayer.”
He also said the city plans to present the idea of hiring current trained volunteers as part-time firefighters.
“Confidence should be there as these volunteers have worked side-by-side with the career firefighters for many years,” Cusat said,” and there would be no disruption in operations while providing the staffing levels that are being requested.”
In response, the union called that solution “a temporary measure and does not address the larger, long-term staffing challenges facing the department.”
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