A Jim Thorpe Borough Council workshop Monday brought strong, and at times pointed, comments over who should be the town’s next fire chief — longtime Diligent Fire Company firefighter Vince Yaich Jr. or retired Philadelphia firefighter and Penn Forest Township resident Charles Sgrillo.

Last month, council tabled a motion to name Sgrillo chief of Jim Thorpe’s Municipal Department. 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. “I don’t know if that is going to happen before next Thursday’s council meeting.”

One of the applications came from Yaich Jr. His dad, Vince Yaich Sr., resigned as fire chief in May.

Firefighter Josh Finsel addressed council first Thursday, presenting statistics prepared by acting chief Bill Diehm on firefighter response rates.

“I highlighted on the first page in yellow all the guys that are in Diligent Fire Company,” Finsel said. “In the top 10 responders, seven out of 10, most of the time, are from Diligent Fire Company.”

Finsel noted that for the entire year covered by the report, “Vince Jr. and Vince Sr. are at the top of the list for most responses.”

“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 quickly. He’s a good leader, and I feel would be a great chief.”

Finsel added he had spoken with Sgrillo and thought “he would be a great recruiter in schools for firefighters.” But he said his involvement in the issue came after a conversation in mid-May following a Broadway false alarm.

“These top seven guys said that if they had to answer to a chief that didn’t really know the town, they might hang it up,” Finsel said. “And that made me panic a little bit, because over the last two years, these guys have been to every structure fire. They’re the first through the door.”

Councilman Mike Yeastedt, a volunteer with Onoko Fire and Rescue, cautioned that the Onoko’s response numbers differ from Diligent because “the Onoko station does not respond to mutual aid calls because we’re not allowed to.”

Gail 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 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 also cited challenges within the fire service, including “no recruitment program in this town … no retention program other than a tax break for volunteers meeting certain response thresholds, no safety officer, no post fire reviews, and a lack of joint training between the two companies.”

“One of the fire companies never sees the chief,” Yeastedt said, “and the EMS committee sought managerial skills along with firefighting experience.”

Strubinger noted that under the borough’s past practice, council simply appointed the chief each year based on a name submitted by the fire department. The current vacancy — a result of a resignation rather than a reappointment — has left council in what he called “unusual territory.”