COATESVILLE >> City Council approved the appointment of an interim fire chief for the Coatesville Fire Department in a 6-1 vote at Monday night’s meeting.
Garry Alderman will fill the part-time position, the salary and benefits for which are covered in the city’s budget for this year.
Councilwoman Ingrid Jones, who dissented in the vote, said she hadn’t seen Alderman’s credentials because the information provided in his resume and interviews with council was all his words, and Jones claimed that this information wasn’t properly vetted.
Alderman was present at the meeting, and said he was glad to be back in the city of Coatesville and excited to work with the staff and volunteers of the Coatesville Fire Department. He’s originally from the Coatesville area, and he started his firefighting career with the Modena Fire Company and later served as the fire chief of the Chester County HazMat Team, but he moved to Horry County, South Carolina in 1999. He served as the fire chief of Horry County Fire/Rescue for 12 years, and has about 49 years of experience working with fire companies.
Council also approved the appointment of Nick Saites to the part-time position of interim public works director in a 6-1 vote, with Jones dissenting. The salary and benefits for this position are also covered by the city’s budget. Saites was not present at the meeting.
In a unanimous vote, council approved a resolution to temporarily combine the Parks and Recreation Advisory Board with the Parks and Recreation Commission to allow them to perform their outlined duties until the groups are able to build the necessary capacity to sustain their respective duties.
Parks and Recreation Advisory Board Chairman Jarrett Jackson, Parks and Recreation Advisory Board Secretary Teresa Salinas and Parks and Recreation Commission Member Kimberly Urban explained to council earlier in the meeting why they felt it was necessary to combine the two groups.
The advisory board and the commission are both seven-member groups. All members of the commission are required to be residents, while only two members of the advisory board are required to be residents of the city, and the other five members must be community organizers involved with local organizations. Jackson is the president of the Coatesville area branch of the NAACP and Salinas is the director of Art Partners Studios.
Jackson said that the members of the advisory board and the commission are having a difficult time scheduling meetings at times that work for everybody and that resources are spread thin. He said that merging the two groups temporarily would allow them to “combine resources to expedite the process of making recommendations to city council as well as continuing the efforts of the commission,” which include organizing cleanup days, holiday celebrations and other events.
“We want to make sure that we’re working not only effectively but efficiently as well,” Jackson said. “We’re doing the best that we can with what we have, but we want to do more.”
Urban said that the commission is suffering from low membership and a lack of participation from some current members. “We have four members on paper for the Parks and Recreation Commission, however only two of us are active and really trying to meet, so I feel it’s really in the best interest of both the advisory board and the commission, and the city for us to combine these two groups temporarily,” she added.
Salinas said that the two groups are unable to accomplish their basic functions, given their current capacity. “We’re meeting, three or four of us at a time, coming up with ideas, but we can’t make recommendations to a functioning commission, so there’s kind of a layer in between us and our ideas,” she said.
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