Former Jim Thorpe Municipal Fire Department Chief Vince Yaich Sr., who resigned on May 28, says years of internal conflicts, alleged violations of department guidelines, and disputes over leadership decisions led him to step down.

In a lengthy interview Friday, Yaich detailed a history of disagreements involving the Onoko Fire and Rescue Company and the Diligent Fire Co. No. 3 — both within the borough, as well as with certain borough officials. He also responded to comments made at a recent borough council meeting, saying they painted a false picture of his tenure.

Early concerns

Yaich said his concerns date back to 2016, before the borough consolidated fire services under a municipal department.

“There were complaints from the neighbors and various other people,” Yaich said of the Onoko station. “There was underage drinking going on over there, fireworks being shot off, all kinds of nonsense. Council decided they were going to go with this municipal department, and naturally, they were met with a lot of opposition.”

Mike Yeastedt, an officer with Onoko and a member of the Jim Thorpe Municipal Fire Department, said the station — formerly known as Fairview — has traditionally had a younger roster compared to the Diligent station, which has mostly senior members. That mix was complicated, he said, when volunteers from the now-closed Phoenix station, which had a long-standing feud with Diligent, transferred to Fairview.

Yeastedt was clear that he was speaking in his role as an officer at Onoko, not as a borough councilman.

“While there were issues, mostly associated with a younger group of volunteers, nothing was ever proven or documented nor were any actions taken to address the specific issues,” Yeastedt said. “Rather than the former fire chief addressing the issues directly, council agreed to go with a municipal department at the behest of the former fire chief.”

Yaich recounted early disputes over firefighter applications, including an incident where, according to Yaich, portions of applications were altered. He said some members who were initially denied were later reinstated — a move he supported for most but not all.

Over the years, Yaich said, he removed multiple members from the department for disciplinary reasons, including for inappropriate contact with minors.

“You start to question the leadership over there,” he said, referring to Onoko’s officers.

Yeastedt disputed that characterization.

“It’s inappropriate to speak about disciplinary matters in public, but there weren’t multiple members removed from the department for disciplinary reasons,” he said, adding that the volunteer Yaich referenced was not a Fairview member and that council, not the chief, ultimately addressed disciplinary issues.

According to Yeastedt, the transition to a municipal department required all volunteers to reapply, even those already serving. The application required a signature agreeing to follow rules and policies, but “nothing was attached to show what the applicant was agreeing to.”

Yeastedt said some volunteers crossed out the signature page and were later refused membership for “incomplete and altered” applications, including a member with 40 years of volunteer fire and EMS experience who was only readmitted after a Lesiureland fire demonstrated a shortage of firefighters.

Training

Drill participation was another recurring issue, Yaich added.

Yaich described repeated failed attempts to schedule joint training sessions, including one where his crew arrived for a planned review of a rescue truck and found the station empty.

“How many times are you supposed to be doing this stuff when they don’t show up,” he said of Onoko’s personnel. “We tried to drill together numerous times. When we went to their station, nobody was there. When it was their turn to host, they didn’t schedule. Eventually, we stopped trying.”

Yeastedt said that wasn’t the case, pinning the end of joint training on a resignation that followed a heated dispute between Yaich and a former Fairview captain.

“There weren’t many failed attempts to schedule joint training sessions because there weren’t any opportunities to train together,” he said.

He added that the municipal department never implemented a joint training plan despite annual requests at meetings, and said Yaich “never implemented or encouraged joint training, nor did he participate in any training.”

“With his knowledge of and experience in firefighting, he could’ve provided valuable training had he chosen to do so,” Yeastedt said.

Mutual aid

One of the more public disputes has been over mutual aid.

Responding to a public comment on call response at Thursday’s borough council workshop, Yeastedt claimed the Onoko station was not permitted to go on such calls.

Yaich said that while Onoko does not respond to mutual aid in most municipalities, it wasn’t because of a decision he made.

“Mutual aid assignments are set up by the chiefs of the neighboring departments, not me,” Yaich said. “The mutual aid assignments that come into this town were decided long before I was chief. There are a lot of towns going to mutual aid 90% of the time. They need the men — not two guys showing up.”

Violations

Yaich also cited violations of the department’s Standard Operating Guidelines (SOGs), including minimum staffing requirements for certain calls and restrictions on excusing junior firefighters from school.

“Most recently, a couple weeks ago, they were called out on a mutual aid to Summit Hill — with only three guys on the truck,” Yaich said. “Our SOG says a minimum of four qualified personnel.”

Yaich said purchase and maintenance procedures were also bypassed, with work and orders arranged without going through the fire chief.

Yeastedt said minimum staffing is sometimes impossible to meet in a volunteer department, and that both companies occasionally send trucks short-handed with the expectation that more firefighters will meet them on scene.

“The former fire chief, as a result of a dispute with a former Fairview volunteer, refused to let borough workers respond to the Onoko station in the event of a fire or incident on the east side of town forcing them to drive across town to the Diligent station only to reverse and come back across town to the east side,” Yeastedt said. “Because many of the Onoko volunteers work day jobs out of town, it’s difficult to always get a full complement of volunteers. Thankfully, many of the Diligent volunteers are retired and available during the daytime hours.”

On purchases, Yeastedt said all orders ultimately require the fire chief’s approval, though requests may also go through the deputy chief or borough manager.

Brush fire

Yaich pointed to a brush fire earlier this year on Bear Mountain as a turning point.

According to Yaich, state law required him to transfer command to the Department of Conservation and Natural Resources once its crews arrived. He said he did so over the radio, with borough officials present.

“DCNR was in charge of this fire, not me,” Yaich said.

A week later, he received an email from the borough manager requesting a post-incident meeting over “a lack of communication” during the fire.

Jim Thorpe Borough Manager Maureen Sterner said the borough activated the National Incident Management System during the fire — something she noted “is not a common occurrence for us” — and wanted to meet afterward with various parties to review how the system worked, what might need changes and what worked well.

“To that end, we gathered the appropriate local officials and had an informative meeting where we reviewed the chain of command and dissemination of information,” Sterner said. “We believe improvements can be made so that the borough has proper and timely information that we can share with our first responders actively responding, and with our residents. We received many inquiries from residents and the information would have enabled us to better assist those residents.”

Sterner said the borough never had any concerns about how firefighters handled the blaze.

“We are fortunate to have qualified individuals in our municipal fire department who have some specialized training in fighting brush and forest fires. We are very proud of the job they did in combating this fire,” she said.

At the DCNR’s after-action review, Yaich said borough concerns could have been addressed but were not raised by those who had expressed them earlier.

“It was a witch hunt,” he said. “That is when I was done. For not doing anything right on that fire — 660 acres, not one structure lost, not one person hurt — I think we did pretty damn good.”

Sterner said the borough administration did not receive timely notice about the DCNR review until after it was held. She added that once the incident management system is instituted, first responders focus on their technical work while the management team handles equipment, supplies and logistics.

“In order to assist all of our first responders, we want to ensure our protocols are beneficial and the best they can be,” she said. “Firefighters, police and other first responders should know that they can go out and do the difficult and technical job of fighting the fires, policing and other emergency tasks knowing that the rest of the team is handling the items associated with the management system part of any incident. We want the first responders to be able to fully concentrate on their tasks at hand and stay safe.”

Recruitment

Recruitment efforts were also debated.

“We have no recruitment program in this town — none,” Yeastedt said last week. “It’s either word-of-mouth or somebody falls off a tree and we get them. There was a plan to do it in CCTI and the high school, but it was never followed up.”

Yaich said he supported a vocational school outreach program that never materialized after one of the organizers resigned.

“It was CCTI’s program,” Yaich said. “It wasn’t ours. Nobody there picked it up to carry it out.”

He rejected claims the department could have done more, saying volunteers are hard to retain unless they understand the demands of the job.

“Every time there’s a big fire, like right after that big brush fire, you’d be surprised how many guys came to me saying, I want to join,” Yaich said. “But once you tell them what’s involved, you don’t see them anymore — until the next big fire.”

Yeastedt said, “The future of our volunteer fire department depends on recruitment of younger personnel while there’s still time for the senior volunteers to train and mentor them.”

Time to walk away

Other grievances included lack of response from certain members to calls — including incidents close to their station — and what Yaich described as council’s unwillingness to address internal problems.

“I’m not going to be the whipping boy, and I’m certainly not going to be involved in a liability lawsuit,” he said. “We’ve had gas leaks and fires a block from the Onoko station — no response. That’s a liability I’m not willing to carry.”

In his final months, Yaich said he considered stepping down before his term was up but stayed on after being asked to continue.

“Maybe we should have had more meetings,” he said. “Maybe we should have tried to drill more. Certain things you get to a point where you agree some changes could be made, but when you try and they don’t show up or want to participate, and all they do is complain, it’s time to walk away.”

Yaich said only one council member, Connor Rogers, contacted him to discuss what led to his resignation.

Chief search

In July, council tabled a motion to hire retired Philadelphia firefighter and Penn Forest Township resident Charles Sgrillo.

Since then, Council President Greg Strubinger said, two more applications came in and interviews were conducted.

“Council’s emergency services committee chair, led by Sydney Wernett, was going to try and schedule a fire department officers’ meeting,” Strubinger said last week. “I don’t know if that is going to happen before next Thursday’s council meeting.”

Council will meet Thursday at 6:30 p.m. at Jim Thorpe High School. The agenda was not posted as of presstime.

One of the applications came from Vince Yaich Jr., who has been supported at meetings by current firefighter Josh Finsel and Gail Solomon.

“I’ve been a firefighter for two years now, responding mostly to structure fires, river rescues, wilderness rescues, and brush fires, and I’ve seen Vince in action,” Finsel said. “He’s a very quick thinker. The brush fire that we had on Pisgah last year — within minutes, he had three different crews on three different fronts, and that fire was put out on a windy, dry day very quick. He’s a good leader, and I feel would be a great chief.”

Solomon said Yaich Jr. was born and raised in Jim Thorpe.

“He’s been a volunteer firefighter for the past 22 years, and right now he’s serving as captain,” she said. “His father was in the fire department for over 50 years, and Vince Jr. pretty much grew up in that environment.”

She added that his knowledge of the borough’s geography allows him to “make immediate response decisions … without having to look at a map or Google,” and that he “lives a half a block from the firehouse” and “works right here in the borough.”

According to Yeastedt, after Yaich Sr.’s resignation on May 28, “the borough asked for candidates and recommendations from the company for the position of chief. “The only one that was presented was Onoko,” Yeastedt said. “Diligent didn’t present anybody.”

Yaich Jr.’s name was first brought up “at the last meeting” and that when asked previously, “He said he was interested in being the Deputy Fire Chief.”

“The EMS committee had considered having two deputy fire chiefs,” Yeastedt said. “Vince Jr. would become an assistant or deputy fire chief … and the thought was to have (Sgrillo) be the chief and provide the managerial support.”

Yeastedt said one of Sgrillo’s strengths would be recruitment.

“Charlie’s good at organizing,” he said. “Retention-wise, we have no program other than Act 172, where taxpaying firefighters who respond to a significant number of calls get a tax reduction. But we have a lot of young people who take a lot of calls and get no reward at all.”

Sgrillo spoke at July’s council meeting.

“I spent 34 years with some the busiest fire companies in Philadelphia,” he said.

Sgrillo was working with the department, helping to train new members when he was asked about the open fire chief position. He applied for the position and was interviewed by the borough council committee.

Sgrillo said he would look forward to working with the members of the area fire departments, and would work on promoting smoke detectors and meeting with children in the area schools to explain the work of the fire department and hopefully convince some to volunteer.

He bought a home in 2014 and became a full-time resident of Penn Forest Township in 2019.

“Jim Thorpe is my home,” Sgrillo said. “If I can help build the best fire department in the area with pride and tradition of excellence, I did my job, and that’s what I plan to do.”

Yeastedt said department unity is something he hopes is addressed going forward.

“I’m not trying to make it sound like there are sour grapes about what took place,” he added. “We’re trying to move forward. But people need to know it’s not all hunky-dory between the departments.”