Popular summer day camp at Hempfield challenged with finding staff

Hempfield’s summer day camp has expanded in popularity, but it is struggling to field enough staff to keep up with demand.

“We’re providing a service that is in great need,” Parks and Recreation Director Marissa Haynes said at a township supervisors meeting this week. “We are maxed out everyday, and in order to meet that need, we need to increase our staffing.”

Both Haynes and township manager Aaron Siko said the pay rate for camp staff is a driver of the staff shortage. Currently, junior camp counselors are paid $10 per hour, according to a posted opening on Hempfield’s job site.

“You could just go to too many other places now and work a lot easier job than dealing with kids all day, in the 100-degree heat with Canada smoke,” Siko said. “As we continue to grow, we continue to take on more and more children with different physical, mental and emotional capacities. With the way that this program has ballooned, and to Marissa’s credit how well she’s done with this program in her tenure here, everyone’s knocking down the door to get in it.”

At the meeting this week, Haynes cited low pay as a driver of the camp’s challenges with finding staff. Sixteen staff members and one program coordinator are employed by the camp, but to keep up entirely with demand, Haynes said, the camp should have closer to 20 staff members.

“There’s always room for more staffing for summer day camp, when working with kids,” Haynes said. “Right now, if we’re fully staffed on a regular day, we try to maintain a seven- or 7½-kids-to-one (staff) ratio, but we could always use more staff.”

The camp is full, with 120 students from grades 1-9 enrolled, and is in its sixth week out of 10 for the summer. Registration prices to participate vary by whether participants are residents of the township, ranging from $1,500 to $1,800 for the whole summer.

Haynes and Siko cited a desire for more qualified staff to support students with additional needs.

“Increased pay would be great because of the needs we have, as well,” Haynes added. “There’s more children with increased behavioral needs, and we need more qualified candidates. In order to offer what more qualified candidates would need, pay is one thing. We need pay and enough people to share the load.”

Haynes noted that it’s particularly difficult to recruit for more staff in the middle of the summer. Earlier in the year, she said, the camp interviewed between 20 and 25 candidates, but some had found other jobs by the beginning of summer.

“What I really think we need to discuss is coverage,” she said, noting that even with 16 staff members, vacancies and short-staffed periods sometimes occur because of scheduling conflicts. “What we really need is some flexibility, so that if people are sick or can take vacation, we need flexibility there.”

Haynes says next year, the program will try to recruit more at a college level and interview more people. The camp will do an assessment at the end of the program in mid-August to make further plans on how to best meet staffing needs.

Participating in the camp is a “big foot in the door when it comes to participating in the community,” Haynes said.

“Families see this as a great way to get to know what services we offer at the parks, and it’s a great way for us to communicate what we’re doing at Hempfield Township. It’s a great program,” she said. “I think there’s always discussions on how we can make our camp better, whether it comes to staffing or programs. Those things are always a discussion point.”