Credit: Chris English/NewtownPANow.com
Newtown Township has taken what is being described as the next step up in strengthening its fire service by filling the new position of assistant fire chief.
Nicholas Weaver started in the job Feb. 16 and was officially sworn in at the Wednesday Newtown Township Board of Supervisors meeting.
He will be second in command to township Emergency Services Department Fire Chief Glenn Forsyth and will take a very active role in helping the chief oversee and guide operations of the township’s crew of 10 paid firefighters (including Weaver and Forsyth) and also the Newtown Fire Association, the volunteer company that serves the township and neighboring Newtown Borough.
Weaver, whose starting annual salary in the new job is $95,000, has strong local roots, having grown up in Newtown, graduated from Council Rock High School North in 2007 and served as a junior firefighter with the Newtown Fire Association. Before starting in Newtown Township, he was fire marshal in Whitemarsh Township, Montgomery County, for three years. Among his other jobs was being a paid firefighter in Bensalem Township for a time.
“I love it,” Weaver said of his new position. “I’m looking forward to working with both the paid staff and the volunteers to make our fire service stronger.”
Credit: Chris English/NewtownPANow.com
He has a bachelor’s degree in Fire Science and Public Safety from Holy Family University and a master’s degree in Public Safety Administration from St. Joseph’s University. Weaver’s hiring is one of several recent steps directed at improving firefighting and prevention operations in Newtown Township and Borough, including an increase in township tax millage dedicated to fire service and a new agreement with the borough upping its financial contribution to fire coverage.
“We want to get the (township emergency services) department functioning at a higher level, and felt one of the ways to do that was to bring in someone at the command level,” Forsyth said. “Nicholas will basically be taking over day to day operations of the department so that I can handle more of the administrative duties.”
