WESTERLO — Westerlo resident and Berne-Knox-Westerlo senior Drew Joslin is helping his community by creating an Eagle Scout project to give veterans, active military personnel, and first responders a place in town to find tranquility. 

Joslin is a junior firefighter; his father, Andrew Joslin, is chief of the Westerlo Volunteer Fire Company, and his uncle is the deputy chief. Drew Joslin had originally wanted to create a firefighters’ memorial outside the firehouse, but the plan fell through. 

When the Westerlo Town Board renamed the town park Veterans Memorial Park, Joslin had the idea to expand the scope of his project to include all military personnel and first responders, he told The Enterprise this week. 

His project, called Heroes’ Way, had him oversee renovation of a trail loop in the park that leads to a clearing overlooking the Basic Creek. With the help of volunteers and sponsors, he’ll have fixed or installed three bridges, three benches, trail markers, and a kiosk that offers visitors information about crisis intervention. 

The major sponsors, Joslin said, were Hannay Reels, J.H. Maloy, GNH Lumber, and Westerlo Town Supervisor Matthew Kryzak and Kryzak’s wife, Becky. 

Each bench will be dedicated to a different segment of the population Joslin is honoring, he said: one for fire workers; one for emergency medical service workers, police, and telecommunicators; and one for military personnel. 

Joslin hopes that giving first responders and military personnel a peaceful place to visit will help in preventing suicide — something that those groups are especially vulnerable to. 

According to the Centers for Disease Control andPrevention, data suggests that both firefighters and police officers are more likely to die by suicide than in the line of duty, and that up to nearly 25 percent of public-safety telecommunicators have post-traumatic stress disorder. However, the CDC notes, the true figures are likely higher. 

When seeking approval for the project from the Westerlo Town Board, Joslin reported that, in 2020, nationwide, 116 police officers had committed suicide, along with 127 firefighters and emergency medical technicians. Meanwhile, 22 veterans die by suicide each day on average, he said.

“What this project is doing is trying to help kind of lower that number of suicides per day from first responders, veterans, and active military personnel,” Joslin told The Enterprise. “Hopefully one day we’ll bring that down to zero, and I’m attempting to do as much as I can to help with that.”

The project will be unveiled on Sunday, Sept. 10, at 1 p.m. at a ribbon-cutting ceremony at Westerlo’s Veterans Memorial Park at 950 Route 401 in Westerlo.