Ekiss is also a certified paramedic. He starts his new job on Monday, May 10.

“I’ve told people we’ve got a good community, good schools, good people – we need to have a good fire department,” said Robert Bryan, a Texas Department of Public Safety trooper who was appointed the new chief. “We’re looking at making it a great fire department.”

Bryan, who was serving as president of the department, said it has been inactive since about 2007. “The membership was there, we just weren’t meeting,” he said. “If we did get a page, it was most likely not answered.

“There was a couple of us that would respond down to the station, but the training wasn’t there,” he continued. “When we did get a call, the other neighboring departments were having to cover us,” because job conflicts made it difficult for them to respond, he explained.

That’s not the case anymore. After being notified by the county this past October that the department was about to lose its funding because it hadn’t signed any contracts for the last two years, Bryan and community members focused on making it viable again. A Jan. 30 re-organization meeting was a success.

“During that meeting, several people from the community met and we came together as a group and reorganized the Elysian Fields Volunteer Fire Department,” said Brian. All 21 attendees joined as members. Since, two more applicants have requested to join.

Harrison County Judge Richard Anderson commended the department for its progress.

“We are very pleased with the fact that the department has reorganized and that the number of volunteers have increased very substantially,” he said in a recent interview in his office. “It not only takes good equipment, but it also takes good people.”

He praised Bryan for his “remarkable” recruiting efforts.

“I commend Chief Bryan for his work and commend the contributions of all members in the department – both past and present,” the judge said.

Bryan said members consist of a diverse group of men and women, who have a heart for the community. They range from businessmen, registered nurses, law enforcement officers, maintenance workers, electricians and more.

“We got just all kinds of people; different backgrounds,” he said. Some, he said, were oblivious about firefighting at first. “All of us have came together to form the fire department. It’s just awesome.”

Twelve members in the department are currently completing a 70-hour basic firefighter training course, presented by the Waskom Volunteer Fire Department.

“We’re getting so much more training and it’s better training,” said Bryan. “(We’re) very thankful for Waskom Fire Department.”

Bryan is also grateful to Texas Forestry Service, fellow departments in the county as well as departments in Panola County that have reached out to offer support and advice.

“I’ve gotten a lot of calls from local chiefs, local members of the community and members of other fire departments – just praise – and that’s a good thing because as far as everybody knew, we were dead,” said Bryan. “All of a sudden, here in the last three months, it’s just been an explosion of activity.”

And, thanks to donations from surrounding departments, they were able to outfit all volunteers in protective clothing, bunker gear and helmets.

“We didn’t hardly have anything,” Bryan said. Two area departments donated trucks, bringing their fleet up to five. “When people hear you’re doing a good thing, they want to help you.”

Since funding is limited, however, a fund-raiser is slated May 8 at the station on Farm-to-Market Road 31 and Farm to-Market Road 451, featuring the company, Stock My Pond.

“We get a percentage of the money they take in that day,” noted Bryan.

“It goes right into the equipment to support the response that the department will have in the community when we’re called upon for fires or what not,” he said of fundraisers.

Bryan said members have cleaned out the station and plan to conduct an Open House tour in the future. Other plans include participating in educational programs, applying for grants for new equipment and eventually expanding its station.

“We’d really like for our station to grow to at least a four or five bay where we can house all our trucks and have an inside area to keep the trucks,” said Bryan.

The department is currently working on becoming National Incident Management System compliant.

“Hopefully, when we expand our fire department down here, we will be a staging point for any emergencies we have down here in Elysian Fields for command, communications or anything like that,” said Bryan.

The chief said at this time, they haven’t entertained the idea of creating an Emergency Service District because they want to improve their image first.

“We want our community to be proud of what they see down at the fire station and when we do ask for an ESD – because that is a vote and that is a tax – we want them to go, ‘You know what, they deserve it. They’ve worked hard.’

“We’re going to be a department with trained personnel and people that are going to be able to address whatever we have at hand.”

Bryan thanked Judge Anderson, his staff and Constable Bill Elliot for assisting the station in trying to get reactivated. The department is happy to assist the community as well as neighboring areas when needed.

“Inner Community in Panola County have a vested interest in Elysian Fields Fire Department because we’re right here on the northeast corner of Panola County,” said Bryan. “We can be at their fire before they can. We’re right here to back them up.”

Bryan added, “I’m very, very proud to be a part of something that’s so positive in our community,” he said.

“Our mission is to protect lives and property,” Kemp said. “Everything focuses on trying to save lives.”

The veteran fireman officially took over as chief on Thursday morning after the City Council approved the city manager’s appointment to the post. Kemp had been serving as interim chief since December when Rhea Cooper retired.

Fire officials lined the back wall at City Hall to witness Kemp being sworn in as the city’s eighth chief.

Mayor Tom Martin said Kemp has a number of positive attributes that will make him a good chief, including his leadership qualities and extensive knowledge of the city’s budget process.

“I’ve been very impressed with his professionalism and his knowledge of firefighting and his ability to be a leader,” Martin said. “It gives me no doubt that he will make an excellent leader for the fire department.”

The future
Interim Fire Marshal Garett Nelson said now’s the best time to have Kemp as Lubbock fire chief. The significant task of leading the department through a period of growth – both the addition of staff and fire stations – is something for which Kemp is well suited, Nelson said. He described the new chief as a visionary.

Nelson said Kemp is perfect for what the department needs now. Some of his strengths include: he is extremely detail oriented, has good administrative qualities and has a background in construction and working with engineers.

Kemp said the three new fire stations will be built within the next four years. The department will need to hire more firefighters to staff the stations, which will expand the agency to more than 400 personnel.

The new fire stations, which voters approved during a bond election last year, will be located at: 116th Street and Quaker Avenue; 67th Street and Oakridge Avenue; 105th Street and Milwaukee Avenue.

Another goal for Kemp is working through issues within the department’s dispatch center and improving communication with EMS.

One significant issue has centered around the fact that the two agencies are working under two different dispatch systems. Kemp said the agencies have software in the dispatch centers that won’t communicate with each other, which is an issue because both agencies respond to medical calls. The fire department has a first-responder program.

The chief is looking to integrate the two systems and open lines of communication with EMS. The process has already begun.

Chris Teague, EMS director, said he is extremely optimistic about the working relationship between the two agencies. “He’s a very good person to work with,” Teague said. “We are excited about him being the chief of the fire department. We look forward to a great communication between EMS and the fire department.”

Teague said the two agencies have set lofty goals that will help them work together better, though he didn’t feel comfortable discussing specifics until all plans and details were finalized.

“We’re opening up the lines of communication between EMS and fire,” he said. “The goal is to make sure we are responding as fast as we can.”

The past
Much of Kemp’s career has focused on fire prevention. He has spent the last 20 years serving the Fire Marshal’s Office, which investigates fires and focuses on fire prevention efforts.

“Education is the key to a lot of what we do,” he said.

Kemp, who was promoted to fire marshal in 1998, said he was proud to have increased the professionalism within the division, which included getting more training for inspectors and investigators.

He said one of the largest and most memorable cases of his tenure was in the 1990s when his office was tasked with finding and stopping a serial arsonist, who had plagued the city with more than 300 fires.

While that was tough, it’s not been the toughest thing of his career. He has seen 25 fire-related deaths during his tenure.

“That affected me so profoundly,” Kemp said. “I saw that fire prevention is the key.”

It’s what drives him.

“That gives me the courage and ability to lead a department to try and stop that,” Kemp said, adding he was humbled and honored at being picked as fire chief.

Kemp said while he has spent most of his tenure with the Fire Marshal’s Office, he also understands the rest of the department.

As fire marshal, he helped with strategic planning and worked directly with all systems related to fires. “I understand how it all works,” Kemp said.

The early years
He doesn’t know a life that doesn’t include the fire station. He was already familiar with the fire department long before he joined in 1982 at age 19.

“I grew up in the fire service,” he said.

A young Kemp sometimes spent nights at the fire station. His dad was a firefighter for 34 years. It seems to run in the blood because he also had three cousins and two uncles who were firefighters. And his brother is currently employed by the Lubbock Fire Department.

Kemp served his first eight years on the department fighting fires. During that time, he was an equipment operator and drove multiple fire engines.

At the same time, the young husband and father also attended night school for five years. He earned an associate of arts degree from South Plains College and a bachelor of science degree from Wayland Baptist University.

Kemp and his wife, Renee, who married during his rookie year, have two children. Their daughter, Ashley Lynn, is married and teaches with the Lubbock Independent School District. Their 15-year-old son, Luke, is a Lubbock-Cooper High School student.

Kemp’s appointment must be confirmed by the Lubbock City Council. Council members will discuss his confirmation at their next meeting on April 8.
__________
New Fire Chief appointed in Lubbock
From KCBD News, Lubbock
City Manager Lee Ann Dumbauld has appointed Interim Fire Chief Mike Kemp as the next fire chief for the City of Lubbock.

Mike Kemp was born and raised in Lubbock, and has worked with the Lubbock Fire Department for more than 28 years. Kemp began his career as a firefighter in January of 1982 before rising through the ranks to become Fire Marshal in 1998. Chief Kemp graduated from the United States National Fire Academy’s Executive Fire Officer Program in 2003, was Certified as a Peace Officer for the State Texas in December of 1992, and has also received the following Texas Commission of Fire Protection Certifications; Advanced Arson Investigator, Advanced Structure Firefighter, Advanced Fire Inspector, and Fire Instructor. Kemp earned an Associate of Arts Degree from South Plains College and a Bachelor of Science Degree from Wayland Baptist University.

Kemp’s appointment must be confirmed by the Lubbock City Council. Council members will discuss his confirmation at their next meeting on April 8. Once confirmed, Mike Kemp will be the 8th fire chief in the history of the City of Lubbock.

Kemp has been serving as Interim Fire Chief since Rhea Cooper retired in December.

In a blistering six-page memo, Kerr said Capt. Guy Groomer can’t perform basic management tasks, lacks the respect of his peers and has a disciplinary history that includes shoplifting and lying to investigators.

The memo said that Groomer, who was next on a promotional eligibility list, had previously been demoted for violating departmental rules.

“Capt. Groomer has not paid back to the department the discredit he brought to it even to this day,” Kerr wrote in a memo Thursday. “I have thought about this action carefully and do not take it lightly or precipitously.”

Groomer has been an Austin firefighter for 23 years, through a union official declined to comment.

Fire union president Bob Nicks said he would appeal the decision and called Kerr’s action unfair. He said Groomer already has served his punishment for previous transgressions. “We’ll be putting all our efforts into seeing this is overturned,” he said.

Also on Thursday, Kerr fired firefighter John Lopez after she said an investigation showed he fraudulently obtained prescription drugs. A disciplinary memo said Lopez provided different accounts for how he obtained the drugs and how much he used.
The memo also said that Lopez first told investigators that he had not distributed drugs to anyone else, but later said he “might have.” Lopez could not be reached for comment.

Kerr’s decision to bypass Groomer for a promotion is the first time in five years an Austin fire chief has taken such action. Details of a 2005 bypass weren’t available Friday, but officials said the firefighter won an appeal and received the position.

In recent months, Austin Police Chief Art Acevedo has denied the promotion of three officers because of their disciplinary histories and job performance, moves that had been rare for previous police chiefs. Two appealed and won; a third appeal is pending.

State law said Kerr may bypass firefighters for promotion if she has a “valid reason.”

In the memo, she said former fire Chief Robin Paulsgrove considered bypassing Groomer for a promotion in 1995 because he had been suspended for “egregious violations of departmental policies and being untruthful about the facts and circumstances.” Instead, Paulsgrove promoted him and placed him on probation for a year.

In 2005, Groomer agreed to a demotion of two ranks amid the shoplifting allegations , according to the memo.

Kerr, who has been chief for a little over a year, said that previous chiefs have since promoted Groomer, most recently to captain in 2008. Since then, she wrote that his performance evaluations are “never more than satisfactory” and that “nothing indicates that he has excelled or even surpassed expectations in any management duty.”

Had he been promoted to battalion chief, Kerr said, Groomer would have supervised an average of 50 firefighters and eight fire stations and would have been responsible for managing responses to fires, rescues and other emergencies.

“With no mitigating factors or achievements to consider, my executive staff agrees with me that Capt. Groomer has failed to exhibit the leadership abilities, judgment and accountability necessary to be a battalion chief,” Kerr wrote.

The Medical Center of the Americas is the collection of medical units that includes the Texas Tech medical school and University Medical Center.

The fire station project would cost about $3.4 million. That would include buying land and construction, Drozd said.

Building one new station would save about $1.6 million from what it would cost to reconstruct the two older stations, he said. The savings could then be used to rebuild another aging station at 3801 Fort Blvd., Drozd said.

Both Central stations suggested for closing would continue to operate until the new one was opened, Drozd said.

The city hopes to find about 5 acres to buy for the new station. That would be large enough to also house another city operation, such as a Sun Metro terminal or parking garage, Drozd said.

City Council members voted 8-0 earlier this month to authorize the city manager’s staff to look for suitable sites for a regional fire station, negotiate to purchase the land and come back with a contract for council approval.

The Alameda station is 61 years old, and the one on Trowbridge is 57, Drozd said. The industry standard is to get about 50 years of use out a station, Drozd said.

The new station would use recycled materials in its construction and have energy-efficient air-conditioning and lighting, he said. It would also be large enough to house the 30 firefighters who work at the two existing stations, plus 20 more who would be transferred from elsewhere in the city. It would house a hazardous materials response team, too, Drozd said.

City Rep. Susie Byrd said she supports the move to a larger regional station in concept but has a couple of concerns. The Trowbridge station is in her district.

She said she wanted to make sure that response times do not decline. “But I have all the confidence in the Fire Department that they’ll work that out,” she said. She also wants to make sure that the city comes up with a good use for the old stations so it does not leave vacant buildings behind.

Byrd would like the city to explore turning the Trowbridge station into a teen center or something that can be used for youth activities.

The other older station — on Alameda — is in Rep. Emma Acosta’s district. She said she was behind the move to create a modern consolidated station.

“For this side of town, it helps response times,” Kyle Fire Department Chief Glenn Whitaker said of the new station. “It’s also a good training facility with adequate space for training.”

The department now has three fire stations and more than 70 firefighters. Only 19 of them are full-time paid employees while the rest serve voluntarily.

Whitaker says that six firefighters will be on duty during the day with two on the nightshift at the new station. To keep up with the growing city, the department plans to hire more in the future with funds generated by the Emergency Services District #5, not city taxes.

“I’m sure there are people out there that think it’s too big,” Whitaker said of the new station. “We’re trying to build it for the future, instead of adding on to it later.”

The station may even help lower home insurance premiums for residents within ESD #5. The Texas Department of Insurance uses a rating system known as the Insurance Services Office, or ISO, to grade the effectiveness of a fire department in its area.

The lower the grade, the better chance insurance premiums will be reduced. The ratings are from the best at one to the worst at 10. The Kyle department currently stands at six in the city and nine in rural areas. The Buda Fire Department recently slashed its rate down to a three, following construction of new fire stations and other improvements.

“We’re in the process of doing a re-rate,” Whitaker said. “I’m hoping to get it done this year.”

The two-story fire station is named after two local firefighter legends: James Miller and George Whitaker, who have since passed away. Both men joined the department in 1946 and served more than 50 years as volunteers.

“They were in before we had any paid positions,” Whitaker said of Miller and his father, George.

Whitaker said he had no idea that the station would honor his late father. “It’s pretty neat,” he said. “It was a total surprise to me.”

Bartlett Cocke, of Austin, which has built all of the Hays CISD schools in the past 10 years or so, constructed the station, Whitaker said.
See photo of station here.

The city’s new police and fire stations are expected to be finished by August, as the city continues to build facilities which will allow it keep up with growth in the expanding community, whose population has jumped from 3,000 to over 12,000 in the last 10 years.

The new police station, which will be built next to City Hall on Main Street, will allow the police department more space to grow from its current headquarters across the street, which was the former Cibolo City Hall. The new building will have several amenities including offices, interview rooms, patrol area, training room, detention cells, evidence processing and storage and room for a possible dispatch center.

The new fire station, which will be city’s second, is being built at Green Valley Road and Cibolo Valley Drive, in the northern part of the city. Once it is completed, it has the capability of offering 24-hour protection once the city is able to hire six additional full-time firefighters. The new station will have an office area, quarters for firefighters, have a backup emergency command center and a three bay garage, and will complement the central fire station located in the older part of Cibolo.

Both public safety buildings, which cost a combine total of $6.4 million, were part of a $27.9 million capital improvements bond issue approved by the voters in 2008.