While I enjoy serving our district and the Estes Valley community, as well as living here in Estes Park, my time is growing short. This is my third time serving as an interim chief, and I’m happy to say that in each case the department had a good outcome. I expect the same here.
We are a strong organization dedicated to serving the citizens and visitors of the Estes Valley. Yes, we have experienced leadership difficulties in recent years, but we have learned from them and are moving confidently into the future. I have no doubt our next fire chief will continue this growth.
So, what are we doing to find a new chief?
Our Board of Directors appointed a search committee comprising two board members and representatives from our volunteers and paid staff.
After a competitive process, our board contracted with an executive recruitment firm that specializes in local government and public safety recruitment. This is GMP Consultants. Our search committee, assisted by our consultant, developed a profile of qualities that we want in our next chief.
These are: servant leader with presence, culture builder, strategic leader and CEO, political and community acuity, operational credibility, volunteer advocate, collaborative regional partner, strong communicator, coach and mentor, and fiscal and governance competence. This profile can be viewed on our website.
So, what’s next?
At the end of May, our search committee will review semi-finalists recommended by our consultant and recommend several finalists to our board on June 1.
These finalists will be invited to interviews on June 18. The public will have an opportunity to talk with the finalists at a meet-and-greet event on June 17. They will then be interviewed by several panels representing our board, volunteers, paid staff, and other organizations with whom we regularly collaborate.
Our board will consider the finalists’ performance during the interviews, their fit with our organization and community, relevant experience and career preparation, and, hopefully, make a choice at their regular meeting on June 22.
After that, there will be the steps related to negotiations and contracts. We hope to have our new chief on board sometime in August.
What is our wildfire risk?
I’ll end this installment with a couple of observations about our wildfire risk. Yes, we did have significant moisture recently, in the form of over two feet of snow. That was only a couple of weeks ago, and you would never know it.
It was a help; it improved our snowpack from the worst ever to tie for the worst. It made a temporary dent in the drought, but we’re right back in it now. There are even indications that we may have more moisture later in the summer and maybe even a wetter-than-normal winter. However, we need to get through the summer, and the fire outlook still looks poor.
Last week, after the Safety Fair, which was a great success, I attended a seminar titled Living with Fire: The Past, Present, and Future of Fire in Colorado, sponsored by our Estes Valley Watershed Coalition.
The main takeaway for me was that fire was, is, and always will be part of the environment we choose to live in. Our responsibility as citizens living with fire is making sure our actions, or inactions, don’t unreasonably endanger our neighbors and the community in general.
This is why vegetation reduction (especially fast-burning junipers), home hardening, and open-burning control are so important. The environment and fire risk are changing all around us, and we must all adapt to them to maintain the quality of life we want.