HONORING CELINA FIRE CHIEF MARK METDKER

“It has been the highest honor to have done what I have loved, and to have given of myself through this calling to the people I have served for nearly half a century.”

- CHIEF MARK METDKER

“I was 18 years old, had just graduated from high school, and I was ready to saddle up on a fire truck and begin my lifelong career as a firefighter . . . so I thought,” recalls Celina Fire Chief Mark Metdker. Like so many boys he grew up with, young Mark Metdker had a passion and a dream of serving in Public Safety. Jumping into his gear and onto a truck and racing across a community with lights and sirens blazing to help a stranger in need would be the ultimate intersection of a calling and a career. He longed to have his chance to join a department and fulfill his dream. In 1975, shortly after his graduation from Lewisville High School, the growing City of McKinney, Texas, was hiring, and Metdker’s dream became a reality.

Public Safety was a point of great pride in the Metdker family. Young Mark came home every day of his childhood hearing behind-the-scenes stories from Denton County. His dad proudly wore a badge as a Deputy Sheriff there, and his mom served in the office of a Denton County Judge. But the bloodline ran even deeper than that. Chief Metdker’s uncle (his father’s brother) was the first paid Fire Chief in the City of Richardson, a position he held for three decades. And many of his cousins and nephews, across the generations, served as firefighters. Perhaps no one, however, had more of an impact on Mark Metdker’s career than the one who has stood by his side since the second month after he joined the McKinney Fire Department in 1975.

Though she had never donned a Public Safety uniform of her own, she loved her young fireman, and he madly loved her. Fresh out of high school, Mark and Cheryle Metdker were married and began a life together that is as strong as ever these 49 years later. “I was fresh out of high school, ready to chase my dream, about to settle into marriage with Cheryle, and I was just 18 years old,” Chief Metdker exclaimed.

“The process was so different back then,” Chief Metdker explained. “A young guy, just out of high school and eager to serve was a prime candidate to become a firefighter.” But for two years, the man who would go on to become the storied leader of one of the fastest-growing departments in the State of Texas was unsettled.

Chief Metdker is a Fire Chief today who is known for his servant leadership style in his department. Throughout the industry, he is recognized as a keen scout and developer of young talent. Perhaps, in 1977, those hidden gifts gave him a sense that something was off just a bit. In the midst of working in a career for which he had dreamed, he was battling a tug-of-war inside. “Here I was, a 20-year-old-kid working in the area I grew up in, doing what I had always wanted to do, and I had this realization that I wasn’t quite yet mentally fit to tackle the task,” Chief Metdker shared.

“Being a first responder is a rush, and it gave me great fulfillment; but I knew if I was ever going to reach the level of success that I longed to achieve as a firefighter, I would have to step back for a season.”

Reluctantly, but showing wisdom beyond his years, Chief Metdker hung up his uniform and helmet and took a temporary detour in his career, never taking his eyes off of that calling. For almost six years, he refined his life and leadership in the private world, working for Otis Engineering, a company in Carrollton that made safety equipment for Halliburton’s Oilfield Division.

There, he could grow in his knowledge and understanding of safety products and a host of personalities with whom he would work. He would make friends easily, a trait that would follow him throughout his career, but he always gravitated towards watching those marked as leaders. Attracted most to those who led by serving, he carefully watched all who managed or provided oversight at the firm. He recognized, quickly, the traits he wanted to develop, in the event he would one day have the chance to lead. Those years were long, but they were transformative. And although thriving in his work environment, Chief Metdker’s drive and desire to return to his first love of Public Safety was overpowering.

In 1983, about the time the epicenter of Dallas dining had shifted from the Stemmons and I-635 corridor to the new restaurant row in Addison, Texas, that Town was in desperate need of firefighters who could tackle the task of leading and leveraging their skills in in a rapidly-growing suburban North Dallas environment. Armored now with a confidence and readiness to return to the life of a first responder and with a Fire Chief ready to welcome him to the Town of Addison, Metdker joined the Addison Fire Department, the place he would call home for nearly a quarter century. Reinvigorated with that passion from his childhood to fight fires, but now doing so with a mantle of maturity and leadership, he quickly rose through the ranks in the booming North Dallas community. From the back of the fire truck, he worked his way to Fire Prevention Captain, and made a name for himself around Texas as one of the highly-regarded future Public Safety leaders in Texas.

Those who know Chief Metdker would agree that he’s never been one looking for the next opportunity or assignment. And after the unique journey that led him to Addison, he was not going to be in a hurry to leave. During his long tenure there, he developed relationships that he would carry with him throughout life. Anyone can come to the ribbon cutting of a Celina Fire Station today and see the legacy of his leadership looking at the Hall of Fame of North Texas Chiefs and top brass he counts as friends and former colleagues who attend every event. Like former Dallas Cowboys Head Coach Tom Landry, Chief Metdker trained his guys to be the greatest leaders in the field. Knowing that would often take them from his department onto other places, he pushed them to their best, and they became just that. So many leaders in Fire Departments today are from his pedigree. He trained the best, and he became the best.

By 2008, the City of Celina was settling into the reality that robust growth was inevitable. Up until recent years, fire service had been provided by the care of a highly-respected Volunteer Fire Department. But by then, there were eight full-time firefighters in the department, and it was apparent that was only the beginning.

Celina needed strong leaders—visionaries who could lead a Fire Department and who had experience attracting and developing talent, architecting the vision and plans for a growing department, and leaders who could walk the tightrope of a community steeped in tradition but open to the looming transition. The Celina Fire Department found that uniquely and perfectly qualified leader in Chief Metdker. He was hired by Chief Jerry Duffield as Assistant Fire Chief and Fire Marshal for the City of Celina.

“I’ll never forget showing up to the Fire Station my first day on the job,” Chief Metdker remembered. “It was a special place—a metal barn behind the lumber yard. It wasn’t much, but it was what we had for the moment. My first order of business was to begin to help shift the thinking of our department from that which was seen to that which was yet to be seen.”

During his first years in Celina, between fire and paramedic calls, he was preparing his department and City leaders for unprecedented growth. By 2010, only two years into his tenure, the City of Celina named Metdker as Fire Chief of the Celina Fire Department. He would eventually get some office space in an older home near the former football stadium (most recently known as C-Town), but with that, would come even more responsibility. In December of 2012, in the midst of selling civic leaders on the plans for multiple new fire stations, they sold him on the idea of a joint role of Fire Chief and Police Chief for the City of Celina. Surely, this would be a temporary assignment. Temporary, indeed, for nearly four long years.

The growth and development of Celina would ultimately make the wearing of both hats nearly impossible, and in October of 2016, Chief Metdker was able to hand off his policing duties and, once again, return to his first love. At the same time, his growing department was moving from the metal barn behind where the lumber yard once stood to a beautiful new Central Fire Station on Preston Road (SH 289). With multiple bays, the best in technology and equipment, and comfortable quarters for his personnel, Chief Metdker had brought the Celina Fire Department to a respectable home that would seem gigantic at the time but would be a catalyst for the design and construction of two more stations that would soon follow. In April, Fire Station #3 was dedicated, and once again, the leadership tree of Chief Metdker was present to celebrate another of his accomplishments. Instead of eight full-time personnel, Celina now boasts 66, and growing.

Chief Metdker’s philosophy with his beloved personnel across the years has been fairly simple: treat people outside the station the same way you treat people inside the station. With neither, is there a chance for an error, he tells them. “We are in the business of changing people’s lives,” Chief Metdker shared. “Outside of our walls, people call on us on some of the worst days of their lives, and they will always remember how they were treated by first responders. That is why we treat the citizens like family members. And inside our walls we also treat each other like family.”

He then shared some forward thinking, although no one was ready to accept the imminence of his own counsel. “I tell folks that what you want to hear at your retirement celebration is not about the calls you made or the heroics, but what you meant to your fellow firefighters. Did you mentor others?

Did you inspire others to be the best, to always do the right thing, to be the example? You want your co-workers to stand up and say, ‘I am the person I am because of him . . . a better firefighter, husband, father, son, or brother.’ That’s the most important thing we do here. We change lives.”

Sixteen years have far too quickly passed since Chief Metdker arrived in Celina and began etching his legacy into the foundation of this community. As Celina folks and friends celebrated the milestone of the third fire station’s opening, Chief Metdker quietly announced that he was ready to hang up his uniform and helmet—this time, for good. It was time to leave his professional love and to ride off into the sunset with Cheryle and their kids and grandkids. The peace and tranquility of retirement years could not be more deserved by a better public servant.

Yet, for a large contingency of people in Celina, hopes were quietly shared that such day would never come. Celina’s Fire Chief will soon trade an office for a countryside home that has been his and Cheryle’s retreat while he served here. With less of his time committed to leading and growing a staff, he looks forward to time spent with their two sons, their daughter, and their four grandchildren. He will stay connected to Celina through his son, Steve, who works for the Parks & Recreation Department. He will remain a part of Public Safety through his son, Jake, who is a Fire Captain in Anna. And he will enjoy some fun with his daughter, Katelyn, works at the Border Casino in Thackerville. Those four grandkids will keep he and Cheryle young, and they will all most assuredly keep that ever-familiar Chief Metdker smile glowing for years to come. For many, it seems too soon; however, for Chief Metdker, the time is right.

“It has been the highest honor to have done what I have loved, and to have given of myself through this calling to the people I have served for nearly half a century,” Chief Metdker shared with gratitude. “Through the best days of this job, and the challenging days along the way, I have strived to live and lead in such a way that, when it came time for me to leave, the department would not miss a beat, because of the caliber of the team we have built. The Celina Fire Department is beyond that point—they will not just survive beyond my tenure, but they will thrive. It will be my joy to watch them from the comfort of a porch overlooking a beautiful pond…to cheer them on…to pray for their care…and for them to know that I am the one who is truly better for having had the chance to share this season of our professional lives together.”