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<\/p>\nArchbald Borough Council President says discussions about the fire stations have been had, but no decisions or votes have been made.<\/p>\n
ARCHBALD, Pa. \u2014 A disconnect between borough leaders and first responders is calling into question the future of two fire stations in Archbald.<\/p>\n
Over the weekend, in a post to the official Facebook page of Black Diamond Hose Company, a user wrote, “Archbald Borough Council has announced it intends to close 2 of the 4 fire stations in the borough.”<\/p>\n
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There was no name attached to the post. Newswatch 16 did reach out to Black Diamond Hose Company, and they declined to comment further.<\/p>\n
Archbald Borough Council President Louis Rapoch did tell Newswatch 16 that a discussion did take place about merging fire companies, but no announcement or official vote was ever made.<\/p>\n
“We have to do it, and they said, ‘Well, you’re not gonna do it. We’re not gonna come out. We’re not gonna fight fires.’ I said, ‘Well, do what you want. We could decertify you, and then you can just go to parades. That’s all they can do,” said Rapoch. “They can’t fight fires.’ But it was never said at a meeting.”<\/p>\n
Rapoch says the borough has been in talks to merge some of the remaining four fire stations since January.<\/p>\n
The two in question would be East Side Hose Company No. 4 along Salem Road and Black Diamond Hose Company No. 2 on Rock Street.<\/p>\n
Rapoch claims poor volunteer numbers and a strain on borough finances are driving the conversations.<\/p>\n
“It’s time. If you can’t get people to come out on a fire, what’s the sense of having it?” asked Rapoch.<\/p>\n
Since nothing has officially been voted on by council, other borough leaders, including Archbald’s mayor, borough manager, and fire chief, did not want to comment on the online post.<\/p>\n
“They just jump on the bandwagon,” said Rapoch. “They don’t know the story, and that’s what’s killing us. It’s unfortunate.”<\/p>\n
Archbald is no stranger to consolidating fire departments. In the past few years, Eynon and Sturges combined to make Hose Company No. 3, and Archbald Hose Company No. 1 closed its doors to merge with Archbald Community Ambulance and Rescue Squad, forming Archbald Fire and Rescue.<\/p>\n
Council President Rapoch says a line item to discuss the borough’s fire stations will be on next month’s agenda.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Archbald Borough Council President says discussions about the fire stations have been had, but no decisions or votes…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":258842,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[178,180,179],"class_list":["post-258841","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-scranton","tag-scranton","tag-scranton-headlines","tag-scranton-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/258841","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=258841"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/258841\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/258842"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=258841"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=258841"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=258841"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}