Excerpts from the ChicagoTribune.com:
Elgin City Manager Rick Kozal promoted Assistant Fire Chief Dave Schmidt to fire chief. Schmidt steps into a post that was held by John Fahy, who retired this summer after more 30 years as a firefighter. Fahy now works for Elgin Community College as Senior Director of Academic Programming and Public Safety at the new ECC Center for Emergency Services in Burlington.
Schmidt. a 27-year veteran was hired on at just 22 years of age. When he began working in the Elgin Fire Department, the city had just four fire stations — it now has seven. They had just started to do hazardous material rescues, and the focus was still largely on fires.
Now, about 80 percent of their calls are for emergency medical services. While they still fight fires, how firefighters approach those fires is very different from back then. Instead of running into a home to fight the blaze from inside, they are often staying outside long enough to knock down the fire before determining if it is safe inside. Some of the new construction materials don’t hold up to fire like old, structural wood did.
While not running into a burning building is anathema for many firefighters, it is the safest thing for them, Schmidt said.
Schmidt also remembers when for Elgin’s largest buildings, they had a three-ring binder with plans and layouts for the building. Now, those plans are on tablets in the fire command vehicle. Those same tablets allow firefighters to track medical records for patients they’ve worked with before, track their EKGs, and provide information gathered in the field to the hospital.
Schmidt said he’s been heavily involved in making sure Elgin firefighters don’t just have access to the technology, but are trained in that tech as well.
On Tuesday, he was part of a mandatory CPR training class. While there is so much technology available to firefighters, CPR is still the basic response for many emergencies, he said.
The city will be using its own human resources department to conduct a broad, national search to find Schmidt’s replacement. Elgin’s fire department has two assistant chief spots, with the other currently held by Bryan McMahan. As many new firefighters were added between 1989-91 when new fire stations were built, those firefighters are getting close to having 25-30 years on the department — retirement age for them, Schmidt said.
