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Permalink Reply by Rob Vest on March 19, 2011 at 4:40pm

I have never heard of this type of a system before. It doesn't sound like a very good idea to me. If the Chief is elected it doesn't mean the most qualified person gets the job, just the one that has the most supporters and campaign money.

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Permalink Reply by ashfire on March 19, 2011 at 5:07pm

We have a charter government which elects a county exec who appoints the police and fire chiefs and the heads of the county depts. We also elect a county sheriff.
Yes we have both a county police and county sheriff office along with town and city police depts and other agencies that provide law enforcement duties. The volunteer fire and ems depts elect internal chiefs to lead them.
I would wonder how a elected county fire chief would work? Would they also elect the county police chief next?
If you have problems within the fire dept how do you replace the fire chief? Do you have him quit or retire, have a recall vote of them then do you have to have another election?

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Permalink Reply by FETC on March 20, 2011 at 10:32am

You should be looking at the county wide consolidation issue. Politicians are deciding on a bill for this and not the communities? Elected Fire Chief issue is putting the apple before the cart.

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Permalink Reply by Andrew Richmond on March 20, 2011 at 11:03am

Several years ago our county consolidated the rural departments into one county department. We kept the chiefs of the individual stations in place and the position of Fire Coordinator was created. The Coordinators job is to act as a liaison between the county commissioners and the 7 departments, take care of the paperwork and records for the departments, handle the payment of routine bills and maintenance of the vehicles and stations as well as a host of other "non fire" related duties related to the administrative side of running the department. The Coordinator does not have command on a fire scene, that is left to the officers of the responding district.
I think that maybe this is what your county or state might be thinking about,if so I think that the title of "chief" would be wrong as most people hear Chief and think of an on scene commander.

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Permalink Reply by Russ on March 20, 2011 at 11:08am

"electing" a fire chief is something i have never heard of outside of volunteer departments and i think that is an outdated way of choosing leaders. in my early carrear it was the guy that bought drinks and liiked the other way during shenannagans. i have seen elected chiefs that had as much command expierence as a glass of milk and i have seen elected chiefs that still should be chief.

Law Enforcement leaders are elected because their work deals with the imposed politics of dealing with incidents involving people who commit offences against people. the fire department deals with incidents related to protection and property loss.

between the two, i'd say "select" law folks and fire officals

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Permalink Reply by Q2Brunner on March 20, 2011 at 2:39pm

Dear FETC 3,

I hear what you are saying, so let me provide a little more background on the issue. We are all for the consolidation.

Over the past 40 years the county has been a hodge-podge of fire agencies that have circumfrential routes to their districts located on the other side of another jurisdiction. Mutual aid and automatic aid contracts are in place (established only 10 years ago) to provide for the closest unit concept.

The issue we are facing is city annexations of unincorporated land, a signifcant inequity in service levels, and a major overlap of service areas for the closest unit but the inability to pay for the service. Out of a total of 20 or so career stations one station is located directly across the street from a jurisdiction boundary and three additional stations are located well within the neighboring jurisdiction. Its all the result of poor planning and a "we'll deal with it later attitude". In fact over the past 20 years at least four different major studies have recommended consolidation, the kingdom wars would always block it.

The consolidation is a good thing because operationally it makes sense, especially with the geographics and demographics of our county. But whoever introduced the bill threw in the elected fire chief aspect, so that's why my original question. I sincerely thank you for submitting your answer.

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Permalink Reply by Q2Brunner on March 20, 2011 at 2:47pm

Thanks to all your replies. Your concerns match mine exactly. Theoretically the outgoing city council member could run for fire chief and get elected and end up trashing the service entirely. Most qualified, or even hiring someone from another community to help fix issues is now out of the question. Ironically it wasn't anyone from our county who submitted the bill, they were from the other end of the state. So I even wonder if it was submitted as a consolidation blocking measure(protecting the kingdoms again). It did make it past committee, so I don't know if there will be any changes to it or not.

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Permalink Reply by Russell Pollard on March 21, 2011 at 6:36pm

We all need to think outside the box. If we are to consolidated an area into a fire district we should still have Chiefs over the individual departments. If we are to have an overall director lets set the criteria that an applicant must meet. Set a accreditation minimum ( FF1, FF2, Fire Officer 6, Training Officer. Haz-mat Technician, years in the Fire service minimum), etc. You may not be able to block the bullet so let's control the amount of powder and type of bullet to be used in the cartridge when the bullet is made. Make it a positive for all departments, not a negative. At least with a set or requirements you should not end up with just another politician, and you will show your willing to work with the proposal.

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Permalink Reply by eddie cox on March 21, 2011 at 10:22pm

Electing any person to lead an organization is totally wrong. I am the chief of a small department; I feel elections "cripple" the Chief as to his job, unless he decides to do the right thing, regardless of the results. A Chief should be selected by a qualifying board who sets the standards as to Who is qualified to do the job. That person should then have their performance reviewed by the fire board, board of directors; whoever "qualifies" the Chief of Department. Anything different causes pure hell. My $0.02

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Permalink Reply by eddie cox on March 21, 2011 at 10:26pm

Electing any person to lead an organization is totally wrong. I am the chief of a small department; I feel elections "cripple" the Chief as to his job, unless he decides to do the right thing, regardless of the results. A Chief should be selected by a qualifying board who sets the standards as to Who is qualified to do the job. That person should then have their performance reviewed by the fire board, board of directors; whoever "qualifies" the Chief of Department. Anything different causes pure hell. My $0.02

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Permalink Reply by Captain William Frazer on March 22, 2011 at 1:06pm

Yep, elected fire chiefs in any department in my opinion is bad news, its hard enough having politics put a chief in position, or anyone for that matter, never mind electing them. It all turns into a popularity contest.

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Permalink Reply by Michael Harkey on March 22, 2011 at 1:47pm

Another part of this to consider is an elected offical, elected by the county can't be fired if they are not good at the job. It would take a legal battle and lawyers to get that person out before their term was up.

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