By Jake Magee
The Janesville Gazette
EDGERTON, Wis. — The Edgerton Fire Protection District Board is moving swiftly in its quest to hire a new fire chief and possibly restructure how the fire department operates.
Board members interviewed fire chiefs from Monroe, DeForest and the town of Beloit to evaluate how the departments operate and see if the Edgerton department needs to restructure itself, board President Doug Dypold said at a meeting Friday.
The board has considered hiring a fire administrator to oversee operations. Board member Dave Viney interviewed Monroe Fire Chief Daryl Rausch, who suggested that Edgerton hire a chief with both firefighting experience and a financial and business administration background.
In Rausch’s experience, every instance of a board trying to manage a department has “failed miserably” and caused “irreparable harm” to the department. Fire departments need someone internally to handle that work, Viney told the board.
“I agree totally,” Dypold said.
Board member Candy Davis spoke to an interim chief at the DeForest Fire Department. The department recently changed from a volunteer to a full-time department, and the chief resigned after about six months, Davis said.
“They never last,” acting Edgerton Fire Chief Ryan Beckwith said from the audience.
“It’s just different,” he said. “It’s a hard transition.”
Board member Evan Sayre interviewed Town of Beloit Fire Chief Gene Wright, who is a big supporter of mutual aid in light of the dwindling numbers of people willing to be volunteer or paid-on-call firefighters.
“He (Wright) was really big on mutual aid, and I don’t think that anybody denies that that’s a savior,” Sayre said.
“The future of the department is mutual aid because we’re all having staffing difficulties,” Dypold said.
The town of Beloit department has an administrator to handle budgeting and other responsibilities, Sayre said.
When the department has a problem, officials first determine if it’s a structural/mechanical, personnel or cultural problem and address it based on that, Sayre said.
“It’s been very beneficial to them,” he said.
All personnel matters at the Monroe Fire Department are handled at the lowest level possible, Viney said.
“I like that,” Dypold said.
The Edgerton Fire Protection District Board will create a personnel committee to help with the process when it meets again at 7 p.m. Thursday, April 7, at the Edgerton Fire Department, 621 N. Main St. The board then will invite the three chiefs to share more of their expertise.
Three months is a proper amount of time to take before hiring a new fire chief, Dypold said.
“We would be foolish to rush into this process without evaluating all of our assets and determining where we want to go in the future,” Dypold said. “We need to get so many things in order first.”
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