STONE HARBOR – During Stone Harbor Borough Council’s Jan. 18 meeting, Fire Chief Roger Stanford provided end-of-year numbers for fire and emergency medical services (EMS) calls in the borough.
According to Stanford, there were 481 fire calls, an increase of 123 calls, up 35% over the prior year. EMS calls numbered 696, up 150 calls, a 28% increase from 2020.
Stone Harbor recently added career firefighters, also trained as EMS providers, to maintain appropriate service levels due to the increasing difficulty of maintaining an all-volunteer department in a borough that had to depend on volunteers from off the island.
Changing demographics and land values made it impossible to staff a volunteer department with individuals who could afford to live in the borough.
The change to full-time firefighters came in time to support the uptick in service calls that appear to be associated with longer stays by second homeowners. Other borough services are seeing the same impact of increasing demand, especially since the start of the pandemic.
