Centralia Fire Chief Jeff Day is retiring at the end of March.
Day rose to the chief’s position four years ago and will have 30 years in the department when he retires. He plans to spend more time with his grandchildren.
Day explained one of the biggest changes in the fire service is the increased concern about cancer.
“Over the years they found out that all that stuff being left on your gear is causing cancer in a lot of people, so basically after we have a fire now, the gear is supposed to be laundered,” Day said. “Obviously, when we get back from a fire, everybody is supposed to take a shower and clean off. We changed a lot of things like, we have certain shoes and apparel we wear at the fire house, and those shoes get taken off and we put our work stuff on when we get on the engine and go on a call. Then we change back out so we’re not bringing something back into the fire house. I think that’s been the biggest change, really.”
Day says he had some trying times during his four years as chief, including having the departments two new trucks out of service at the same time while three of the firefighters were also on light duty.
Day says the department facing equipment concerns moving forward.
“Another new engine, because currently one of our backup engines is from 1993 and it’s been around a while, it’s got a lot of engine hours on it,” Day said. “One of our aerials, which is a 2002, has almost 10,000 hours on it. That equates to roughly 500,000 miles. They’ve been run hard and it’s time for some new ones. I know right now a new engine with nothing fancy is a million dollars, so I know it’s going to take a little bit.”
Day says the city’s finance director is working to try and find grant money to pay for a new engine.
Centralia City Manager Galen Mahle says a search is now underway for a new fire chief.
“Our hope would be to have someone in place before March 29, when Chief Day retires,” Mahle said. “That way it can be a seamless transition and not have an interim, but certainly in the past we’ve had that where we haven’t been able to get someone hired or started prior to the last day of a chief, and we could go with an interim chief. We are hopeful that we will be able to fill that position by March 29.”
The city is advertising nationally through Indeed. Day says there are also some current members of the department that would like to be promoted to chief.
