SNYDERSVILLE, MONROE COUNTY (WBRE/WYOU) — A local volunteer fire company is shedding light on its need for funding to continue its service in the Poconos.
You can always find turnout gear out at firehouses like the Blue Ridge Hook and Ladder in Snydersville ready for firefighters to grab and go in an emergency. But when there isn’t a call in Monroe County, they’re closing up shop and heading to work.
Blue Ridge is 100% volunteer, meaning a majority of its funding comes from grants and fundraising.
City crash seriously injures pedestrian“We’re all either leaving work, getting out of bed, getting up from the dinner table with our families. Nobody’s just hanging out at the firehouse the way some people think that it’s staffed all the time, it’s not.”
However, Chief Paul Warnick says donations have decreased tremendously and they’re struggling to keep up.
“We have so much fundraising we have to do to try to keep the doors open here, that when people join, we’re doing more fundraising than training and everything else.”
The fire company has been in service for nearly 120 years, but Chief Warnick says if they remain at this budget, they’ll only be operational for the next two.”
One of its biggest fundraisers used to be a letter drive sent to residents in its serving townships of Ross and Hamilton, but only about 13% of residents have donated.
Assistant Chief Leon Clapper, who was the former company chief for more than thirty years, says this leads to challenges of buying new equipment or maintaining vehicles such as this truck that's over 20 years old.
“Trucks were a hundred some thousand dollars back when I first became chief, then they went to three hundred some thousand, then they went to three-quarters of a million. Now they’re at a million three hundred thousand.”
That’s why they’re asking for the public’s help in support with donations.. And to push for a fire tax.
Ross and Hamilton are two of five townships that don’t have one in the county.
“Nobody likes taxes, I get that, I don’t like taxes. But the way a fire tax would work is it could be between 60 to 100 dollars a year annually and that would more than fund a fire company,” says Chief Warnick.
Chief Warnick says he hopes they can all come to a solution for a more sustainable budget.
Blue Ridge Hook and Ladder’s budget is on a discussion board for Ross Township on May 1st at 6 p.m.
To donate, head to their website.