Alig grew up in the township and graduated from Vandalia Butler High School. He began working for the fire department in 1982, just after high school graduation, and stayed for 16 ½ years before being named chief at Riverside, where he has been the last 12 years.
Now, he’s back.
“They had some issues (here),” Alig said. “I thought some of the changes we made in Riverside would work here.”
Alig will be in charge of two Butler Twp. stations, the main one on Little York near the corner of South Dixie, and a two-person unit on Frederick Pike.
“There’s a lot of management and administration,” said Alig, who began his career early to see if that was the path he wanted to follow. It was.
“The fire chief isn’t necessarily like the old days, the first to respond and the volunteers come from home. Now, everyone’s at the station for quick, fast response.”
The main fire station is staffed by seven to eight people at all hours, and “during the day the TV’s not on and they’re not laying back in recliners,” Alig said. “We have to make sure the services are there and ready to go when there’s a need. We have to have personnel properly trained and in the right locations. Our apparatus has to be up and ready to go. There’s a lot of fixing, cleaning, changing light bulbs. The equipment has to be checked.
“An EMS call will take up about two hours and you have to come back and enter reports in the computer system.”
A real fire?
Maybe once a month. Most of the calls are for EMS situations. Fire personnel also give safety presentations, CPR classes and do inspections for businesses.
“We stay busy,” Alig said.
The township also swore in new administrator Kimberly A. Lapensee, who takes the place of Joe Flanagan.
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