Hatfield Hires First Full-Time Firefighter, Debates School Mask Mandate

HATFIELD -- August 17, 2021, Hatfield Select Board welcomes its first full-time firefighter while clashing with the Board of Health over a school mask mandate. Chair Luke Longstreeth presided over the August 17 meeting, where Fire Chief Bob Flaherty introduced Richard "Ricky" Siliberto as the department's first full-time firefighter-EMT, paid through ambulance receipts and already fully apparatus-certified after nine days. The board unanimously declared surplus eight turnout coats, four turnout pants, and four pairs of boots, all out of federal compliance, for donation to Beirut, and approved a paramedic pay rate of $24.07 per hour effective July 1. Member Edmund Jaworski pressed Board of Health members on the basis for a school mask mandate issued before the school committee had voted, calling for reinstatement of former COVID coordinator Carrie and demanding metrics-based decision-making. Fire Chief Flaherty, serving as Emergency Management Director, noted Hatfield had recorded just three COVID cases in the past 65 days, arguing that figure did not warrant a municipal building mandate.