SOMERSET —
Strapped for manpower, the Somerset Volunteer Fire Department said Friday it will withdraw by July from a contract to provide the county’s hazmat team – plopping a new challenge in the commissioners’ lap.
The Somerset County commissioners were thankful for the efforts of the volunteer squad, which has provided the state-required county hazardous materials team since 1992.
But they and emergency services officials now must either piece together a new squad by July 1, or hire a team from an adjoining county or from the private sector.
“In those decades, the number of calls
– not necessarily hazmat calls – have gone up 250 percent,” fire department President Henry Cook told commissioners.
Yet manpower has not risen commensurately: Stringent training requirements, competing time demands and employers less willing to give firefighters time off all have taken their toll.
President Commissioner Pamela Tokar-Ickes said that with the growing Marcellus Shale gas industry and the nearby turnpike, “This is a huge issue for Somerset and the county as a whole.”
The team is trained to respond to a wide range of emergencies. They include collecting pollution discharges that threaten fish, mopping up roadway gasoline and oil after a traffic accident and advising on how to handle chemicals at a train wreck or fire.
Rick Lohr, coordinator of the County Emergency Management Agency, told the commissioners at the specially called meeting that he would send out a letter later Friday to all Somerset fire companies.
He’s asking volunteers to notify his office if they’re interested in marshaling either a county-wide squad among departments or if one department would care to provide a team.
He wants written responses by March 1.
The current contract with the Somerset fire company is for $20,000 per year, and state grants are available over and above that, Lohr said.
Somerset fire Chief Gary Thomas stressed that members of his department would do whatever they could to smooth a transition to a new system.
Cook was hopeful that local volunteers would take the reins.
“There’s a passion for protecting our community,” he said.
Tokar-Ickes said the county’s next step would depend in large measure to the response to Lohr’s letter.
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