At its June 3 meeting, the Upper Darby Council voted to use eminent domain to acquire the Upper Darby 1 Fire Company building, after the nonprofit fire company had decided to sell its building.
The fire company’s action came after the township demanded that all its nonprofit fire companies send detailed statements and receipts to be reimbursed for expenses in March. Previously, the township had paid them $14,000 per month for upkeep of their buildings, fuel for the fire trucks, and other costs. However, the fire department apparatus is owned by the township.
John McDevitt, a member of Upper Darby Fire 1 since 1972, said he was “disappointed” by what’s been going on in the township since March.
He noted that the number of volunteers is declining, and the firefighters who staff the house are professional.
“This fire department did a lot of things for the youth … maybe there wasn’t a father figure at home, but there were six of them at the firehouse.”
He told the council to go and visit the building to see how large it is, noting that the fire company pays for fuel for the firetrucks.
To Mayor Ed Brown, McDevitt said, “You should be doing everything you can to make that volunteer system work out for the community, for the taxpayers, and also for the kids who have gone on to become police officers and done other civic duties. I’m disappointed, really disappointed.”
Township Chief Administrative Officer Crandall Jones said even though the township wants to use eminent domain to take the firehouse, “We are required to pay market value.”
To that end, they’ve hired an appraiser to put a value on the firehouse.
Another resident asked how the township would pay for this purchase, and Jones said it would use the $14,000 a month that would have gone to the fire company, but agreed that a mortgage might be needed.
“We had volunteer firefighters who gave their blood, sweat, tears, and lives for the residents of this township, and this council and this mayor and this administration have treated those people extremely poorly,” one woman said.
But another woman supported the township taking the building.
“I was shocked as a resident of Upper Darby for a long time, the fire department would rather sell their building than be accountable for $14,000 a month,” she said. To me, they acted like a bunch of toddlers who couldn’t get their way.”
Another issue is the Upper Darby Firefighters, who are largely paid township employees responding to fires in neighboring communities that are staffed by all volunteers.
Millbourne Borough is the only town so far that has an agreement with Upper Darby to send payments to defray the cost of the township responding to fight its fires.
At the Monday night council meeting, officials said they’re in talks with two other municipalities to ink payment agreements.
The lack of volunteer firefighters is a statewide issue, although Pennsylvania offers programs for volunteer firefighters, including tax credits.
Firefighters from Upper Darby’s five fire houses responded to 87 out-of-town incidents from Dec. 17, 2025, to Feb. 11, 2026, according to township information that a resident accessed through a right-to-know request. And the Upper Darby fire companies responded to 109 out-of-town incidents between Sept. 1, 2025 to Feb. 9, 2026.
While the administration says they’re talking to other municipalities for payment agreements, a fire department insider said the administration has actually downplayed the cost to the township of Upper Darby firefighters helping other departments, as well as the danger to local residents when Upper Darby Fire Companies are responding elsewhere.
Four of those companies are staffed with township-paid firefighters. Drexel Hill, the fifth firehouse, still has volunteer firefighters.
Being a firefighter these days is “a career path, not a hobby,” he said.
“Fire is a science,” he said. “There’s a lot of stuff behind why we do what we do. You have to understand every action is going to react to something else. If you open the window at the wrong time … superheated gases of 3,000 degrees, they’re looking for air.”
And because it has specialized squads — water rescue, ice rescue, swift-water rescue, confined-space rescue, vehicle, and heavy machinery rescue — Upper Darby firefighters can be called to help countywide.
“Basically, any situation requiring specialized services,” the insider said. “They also have a cache of county equipment and vehicles, as well as township and Firefighters’ Relief Association-owned equipment,” he said. “These are high-risk, low-frequency events.”
“Every time a piece of apparatus is moved it incurs a cost,” he said. “Mutual aid to other fire departments has a risk exposure.”
Upper Darby has salaries, benefits, and overtime, as well as possible disability payments if a firefighter is injured. And there’s wear-and-tear on the vehicles and fuel, as well as insurance.
“All that has a monetary cost to it,” said the insider.
“If we go to 500 more responses a year, that increases cost, that increases risk, that increases a lot of things. So, in the sense where we’re at now, the equitable exchange of services — help each other — that isn’t what’s happening here. Municipalities outside of Upper Darby, who we originally relied on (to come and help them), cannot volunteer a response. You have times of day and night when they might not respond at all. They’re using us.”
Although, Springfield and Sharon Hill pay some firefighters during the day and Broomall is starting to, he said.
“Upper Darby spends more time going to surrounding municipalities providing fire protection and doesn’t get back the same support in return when we need it,” he said.
And Upper Darby has fewer than the recommended number of firefighters, as it is, he added.
“Ideally, we work with sixteen firefighters per shift,” for each firehouse, he said. But they often don’t.
And fighting fires without as many firefighters as needed can add to the danger since each person must perform additional roles, he said.
“Operating with staffing levels that fall short of recommended benchmarks hinders the effectiveness of crews tackling vital emergency duties. When personnel counts are diminished, the burden of multiple responsibilities falls upon fewer individuals, inevitably stalling the commencement of fire suppression efforts and complicating the preservation of residential assets,” said a December 2025 report by the International Association of Firefighters, Local 2493.
The Upper Darby firefighters made an average of $100,000 per year in 2025. Currently, neither the police nor firefighters’ unions have contracts.
In a related matter, at the June 3 meeting, the council approved $531,000 to purchase two new firetrucks through an intergovernmental agreement. Money for the firetrucks was approved as part of the capital budget.
“The vehicles are much needed by the fire department,” said Jones.