West Point fire department making strides, but Hempfield officials to keep probation in place

Hempfield’s West Point Volunteer Fire Company still is failing to respond to calls, but other factors are starting to improve, township leaders said.

So far this year, West Point failed to respond to 33 out of 55 service calls. That’s a 60% failure rate.

While those numbers remain an area of concern for the township, slight improvements are seen at the station, which has 16 active members — four of whom are reserve members from Hempfield No. 2. In addition, training hours are increasing.

As the station works toward bettering those numbers, it will remain on probation until it reaches benchmarks laid out in service agreements, township fire Chief Tony Kovacic said. The agreements, which detail several requirements, were signed by township fire stations in 2020.

“With the upswing that they’ve experienced, I think we continue to monitor the situation both in training and response and then reevaluate this,” Kovacic said.

An update on the situation was provided after West Point President Jessie Zemba questioned the station’s standing during last week’s township supervisors meeting.

West Point was put on probation in June after the station failed to respond to 81 calls during the first half of the year. Several members, including the fire chief, resigned.

During the initial probation period, West Point was required to submit a corrective action plan.

By December, however, supervisors said the plan was not working as the number of failed responses increased to 194.

That means, in 2021, the station did not respond to 275 out of 379 calls. At that time, West Point’s probation period was extended through Jan. 31.

The situation seemingly started to improve at the end of January, something Kovacic attributed to Justin Calisti joining the station.

Calisti, who has 16 years of fire service experience, quickly climbed the ranks to captain. During his time with the station, he has worked to improve training and response times.

“Right now, I’m just trying to help get things ironed out between the township and (West Point) and just make sure our members are doing what’s required of them, what the fire department is asking per month,” Calisti said. “Just trying to help encourage the members to … look on the positive side and keep motivating (them).”

Kovacic applauded Calisti’s efforts to increase training at the station.

“We’re at the beginning of this, but hopefully he’s going to be an instrument for change,” Kovacic said. “Certainly, the numbers we had last year were not very good.”

Points of contention

Despite West Point making improvements, several members have expressed frustrations with working with the township.

“The communication from the township to our department is poor at best,” said Zemba, West Point’s president. “The silence is deafening.”

She said the station has yet to receive relief funds distributed once a year by the township. The relief funds are distributed by the Pennsylvania Department of the Auditor General and local municipalities to volunteer firefighter relief associations to help cover costs of training, equipment, insurance and death benefits.

West Point’s relief check would have totaled about $21,000, Township Manager Jason Winters said.

According to Winters, West Point receiving the check was contingent upon it providing financial documents for an upcoming audit.

When it did not reach the deadline, the check was put into the township’s relief association. He noted, at this point, the township has received the station’s financial information.

“It was well beyond the deadline of asking for the information, so the funds will still be used for other fire related materials within the township,” Winters said. “Next year, all of the fire relief money — because we’re paying for all fire related items — will be going into the township account.”

Miles Webb Jr., West Point’s treasurer, said the money covers life insurance costs for firefighters.

The township has continued to pay for gasoline, vehicle insurance and workman’s compensation, Winters said.

Moving forward

Despite issues identified by the department, township supervisors are hopeful for the future of the West Point station.

“My hope is that we continue to maintain that level of transparency and communication between the fire service and the township organization so that we can continue to fulfill our obligation to protect the community through the volunteer fire service,” said Supervisor Bill Bretz.

Supervisor Doug Weimer, who lives in the West Point neighborhood, recognized efforts made at the station while acknowledging fire companies across the state are facing similar situations.

“There’s been a true effort by everyone to do what they need to do to ensure public safety in that area,” Weimer said. “There’s some data that sort of points out there definitely were areas of concern. It’s nice to know, the last month or so, there’s been a change, and I hope that’s the beginning of better things to come.”