Fairview, Phoenix fire companies to become Onoko Fire and Rescue

The fire company operating out of the east side of Jim Thorpe is getting a new name, but it’s one with a strong history in Mauch Chunk.

During Thursday night’s borough workshop, Councilman Mike Yeastedt said the new company, Onoko Fire and Rescue, would be coming out of a merger of the Fairview and Phoenix hose companies.

“We have received approval from the state and the county has also voiced no objections,” Yeastedt said.

At one time, he added, the Onoko Fire Company existed in East Mauch Chunk at the site of the current American Legion. The Phoenix and Fairview members decided they wanted a name change rather than retaining one or the other.

“Since Onoko is a historic name in our area and it had once been a fire company in East Mauch Chunk, it made sense to continue the heritage,” Yeastedt said after the meeting.

At next week’s voting meeting, council plans to ask its solicitor Jim Nanovic to begin working on an ordinance ratifying the change so that when the statement of merger and change of name are in hand, the process can proceed.

“Ideally, we’ll have a meeting at the Fairview Hose Company later this month to go through some procedural things, and after that file for the statement of merger and change of name,” Yeastedt said.

The borough is hoping to have that complete and the ordinance updated by July so it can merge its firemen relief organizations from two to one.

The move will officially mean Thorpe would have one fire company operating out of each side of the borough with Onoko Fire and Rescue on the east side and the Diligent Fire Company No. 3 in the Heights section of town. That has essentially been the case for a number of years since the borough sold the Phoenix building on West Broadway in 2018 and moved equipment to the Fairview station.

Phoenix personnel noticed several cracks in the station’s floor in November 2014 and an engineer’s evaluation confirmed the structure was failing. Officials said at the time it would cost at least $115,000 just to fill the basement in for the front third of the firehouse.

“Unit 1151, a rescue, was relocated to the Fairview station for a few years and with many of their original members dispersed throughout town or even gone from town, the Phoenix station was closed and eventually sold to a private individual,” Yeastedt said.

Both remaining companies, Onoko and Diligent, fall under the umbrella of the Jim Thorpe Municipal Fire Department, which borough council formed in 2017 to gain greater oversight.