Roundtable Talk - Shared Vision: What Your Department Can Do to Support the National Cohesive Wildland Fire Management Strategy

Doug deBest has been involved in the fire service for over twenty-nine years, with the majority of his time spent in volunteer roles within volunteer or combination departments.  He has served in many different compacities within the fire service; from volunteer & career roles on municipal departments, part-time on a private fire department, and even as an industrial fire brigade member.  Doug served on the Baroda Fire Department for fifteen years, rising from the role of firefighter to the rank of Fire Chief.  Currently, Doug serves as a Lieutenant and the Training Officer for the St. Joseph Township Fire Department – Station # 1.

Chief Johnson's career spans 25 years of public service.  In his early career he started the fire service in 1993 with the El Dorado County Fire Department and joined the U.S. Forest Service in 1995 where he held positions from firefighter to fire captain.  He was an instructor of Fire Science at the College of Southern Nevada.  Later he held the positions of Assistant Chief and Fire Training Instructor at Clark County Fire Department in the State of Nevada. These roles required him to supervise a paid and volunteer firefighting staff, 13 Fire Stations and EMS personnel. 

Currently Chief Johnson is the Fire Chief for Ebbett’s Pass Fire District, a position he was appointed to in September of 2014. The Ebbett’s Pass Fire District provides fire suppression, advanced life support, and ground emergency medical transport for its 6,750 residents and visitors within the Special Districts 225 square mile boundary. Chief Johnson is very proud of the quality of service provided and their bound to our community.

Nick Arnett is a firefighter, Fireline EMT, Public Information Officer, and Critical Incident Stress Manager with the US Forest Service and is a Medical Unit Leader on a national Complex Incident Management Team. He is a California State Fire Training Instructor and volunteers with Spring Valley Fire Department near San Jose, California. Nick was a paramedic in the Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, area in the 1970s and 80s, then moved to California, where he switched careers into journalism, market research, and software product leadership, but stayed involved in disaster response. After a line-of-duty death in his family in 2004, Nick joined the Bay Area Critical Incident Stress Management Team and later became a chaplain with the California Fire Chaplain Association.

Dave has been the State Fire Supervisor for Massachusetts since 2007, and during in tenure has been the chair of the Northeast Forest Fire Supervisors, and is the current Chair of the Cohesive Strategy Northeast Regional Strategy Committee, and represents the Northeast States on the NWCG Incident Position Standards Committee.  He is has been in the fire service, both structural and wildland, for over 30 years, and was a rural call/volunteer Fire Chief prior to taking on his current state role.