Danforth resolves fire chief dilemma Most volunteers return after month off

DANFORTH – A dispute between the local volunteer Fire Department and selectmen has ended with the election and subsequent confirmation of a new fire chief.

Duane Young, the former assistant chief for the Danforth Volunteer Fire Department, was elected chief by department members Aug. 15. Selectmen confirmed his election and nomination to that post on Aug. 21, according to Town Manager Tammy Bonner.

Young’s brother, Eric, was elected assistant chief.

The election-confirmation process was at the center of a two-month dispute between the department and town officials. Selectmen had failed to confirm the department’s nomination of former Chief Vernon “Butch” Cropley, following his election by firefighters. Cropley had served as chief of the department for 15 of his 17 years with the department.

The town’s charter stipulates that firefighters elect a chief, and selectmen can consider that nomination, but are under no obligation to automatically confirm the nominee.

Three times firefighters submitted Cropley’s name, and each time, beginning in early June, selectmen declined to confirm him for that position.

On July 12, after the third rejection, all but four of the department’s 15 firefighters took a leave of absence.

On July 19, town officials presented Cropley with a list of reasons why they would not confirm his election. Those reasons included that Cropley was uncooperative with town officials, that a tanker truck was empty when it responded to a fire and equipment had fallen out of another firetruck en route to a fire, and that he was rude to the public.

For a month the department was staffed by former volunteers who came back on a temporary basis to help out and other people in the community who wanted to help and were given some basic training to get them started.

Some of them have decided to stay.

“There’s been quite a few new members join,” Bonner said Monday, adding that all but one of the volunteers who were out on leave has returned to the department, including Cropley.