Garden City Park FD approves lower age limit

Noah Manskar

Some 17-year-olds may soon be able to join the Garden City Park fire department.

The fire district’s Board of Commissioners voted Thursday to lower the fire department’s membership age from 18 to 17 in an effort to boost membership.

“The more help, the better,” Commissioner Peter Chimenti said.

The option will only be open to 17-year-olds who have gone through Garden City Park’s Junior Firefighters program, a stipulation the New Hyde Park fire department also has in place, First Assistant Chief MIchael Magas said.

Between 25 and 30 junior firefighters are currently active in the program, which gives high school students in-house training and early exposure to firefighting, Chimenti said.

The change will likely help more junior firefighters transition into full fire department membership, Commissioner Kenneth Borchers said.

“It’s an incentive for the people that are in that program, it helps that program and obviously, manpower-wise, it helps that too,” fire distrct attorney Michael Frank said. “But you also have to be careful because they are of high school age, and you have to put special rules in place to make sure that they can perform their duty safely.”

The department’s chiefs will likely consult other fire departments to determine such rules, Frank said. For example, 17-year-olds cannot respond to fire calls during school hours or after a certain hour at night, he said.

The New Hyde Park fire department has parents attend membership interviews for younger members, Magas said.

The Manhasset-Lakeville and Port Washington fire departments also allow 17-year-olds to join with parental consent.

Port Washington 17-year-olds don’t have to be junior firefighters before becoming full fire department members, Chief Brian Waterson said.

The department has currently has between 15 and 20 17-year-old members and prohibits them from responding to calls during school hours, he said, but does not have a curfew in place.

Joining early allows young firefighters to get reimbursed for part of their college tuition, Waterson said.

“They can start learning before they’re off to college,” he said.

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