Firefighters to receive new workout equipment

By Dana Casadei

Bloomfield Township fire stations will be gaining new workout equipment after receiving unanimous approval for the purchases at the Bloomfield Township Board of Trustees meeting on Monday, November 27.

There were three bids for the workout equipment for the Bloomfield Township fire stations, with Bloomfield Township Fire Chief John LeRoy asking the board to award the project to Exercise Warehouse, which the current exercise equipment was purchased through.

LeRoy sung the praises of Exercise Warehouse, noting that they’re phenomenal to work with and whenever they’ve called to fix equipment their team is out there by the next day.

Items included in the purchase are treadmills, tricep ropes, weights and a variety of other machines.

The workout equipment package for the four fire stations will replace the current workout equipment and cost $46,633. It will be paid in part by the assistance to firefighters grant (AFG) for Firefighter Health and Wellness that the Bloomfield Township Fire Department was awarded this past summer.

Bloomfield Township will only have to pay $4,663. thanks to the AFG’s 10 percent matching funds grant.

This portion of the grant being spent will cover the first part of its spending focused on equipment, with the other two parts coming later before the board of trustees.

It will focus on areas of health and wellness in regards to providing physicals and cancer screenings for firefighters and trainers to come up with firefighter-based workout strategies. They’ll have four people trained pre-shift to make sure everyone is doing it safely.

The total amount awarded to the fire department from the grant was $146,770.