Credit: Chris English/NewtownPANow.com
Newtown Township Supervisor Elen Snyder is calling for the municipality to consider a new facility for emergency services.
At the Newtown Township Board of Supervisors meeting last week, Snyder said the township has “a great need for two new buildings” – one for police and another for firefighters.
“Our firefighters are working a place that contains noxious fumes that cause cancer and heart disease,” Snyder said during her supervisor report. “How can we take our firefighters’ lives for granted like that? I don’t understand it.”
The supervisor referenced national statistics about firefighters working in contaminated environments.
Snyder explained that modern firehouses require separation between contaminated “hot zones” and decontaminated “cold zones” to protect firefighters’ health. The contaminated zones contain engine exhaust and turnout gear worn while battling blazes, which are “full of PFAS, a cancer-causing substances.”
“This is a fact and not speculation,” she stated.
According to Snyder, proper facilities would allow firefighters to immediately take off contaminated gear upon returning from calls and enter clean areas where they can shower to remove carcinogens from their skin. The contaminated turnout gear would then be processed in specialized washing machines and dryers.
“There is a document that our fire department can provide that says all of this,” Snyder noted. “Everything that I’m saying is in a national fire safety document.”
The supervisor also highlighted practical needs beyond health concerns, including space for two new fire engines arriving in the coming years and sleeping quarters for paid firefighters.
“We need a place where they can sleep, where there are small bedrooms, where they don’t have to get alerts that take them out of their bed and into their cars and over to the station,” she said. “Instead of that, they can sleep in areas that are set up in a new fire station for sleeping purposes.”
The municipality continues hiring paid firefighters, which covers the township and borough due to a lack of volunteers.
On the topic of police facilities, Snyder described the current station as inadequate for modern law enforcement operations.
“Our police work in small rooms, boxes, really. There’s not a place where they can all sit down in a meeting to hear from the chief or whoever is assigning duty crews,” she said. “The small rooms can accommodate sometimes one desk or two for the detectives interviewing suspects as well as doing their own paperwork. Those rooms are one and the same.”
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The supervisors characterized the current police building as “more suited for teaching preschoolers” rather than serving as a proper police facility.
“It is not really a police administration building. It is very short of being that,” Snyder said. “But they make it work, of course, but they need a new building.”
Snyder concluded her remarks by urging fellow supervisors to consider the daily risks faced by emergency responders.
“I hope all the supervisors will take that into account when they’re thinking about the lives of the firefighters that every day put themselves in danger,” she said.
The supervisors have entertained discussions over the few years about the possibility of new stations. Newtown Fire Rescue uses the station in on Liberty Street in Newtown Borough and one at the municipal complex off Durham Road in Newtown Township, and the police department station is at the municipal complex.
New Supervisor Edward Merriman was recently appointed as chairperson, and Supervisor Melissa Merk was appointed as vice chairperson.
“I love Newtown Township, a great place to live. And I look forward to doing what I can to work for Newtown,” Merriman said during his opening remarks.
