Q&A

In the Hot Seat

Newly appointed San Luis Obispo Fire Chief Garret Olson takes our questions.

Both you and SLOPD Chief Steve Gesell were colleagues in Arizona. How’d you meet?

In Scottsdale the police and fire departments shared a headquarters building; there was a hallway down the middle with police on one side, fire on the other. When I first met Steve he was the commander of the SWAT Team and I was the Fire Operations Chief. Our personalities just seemed to mesh. When Steve moved on and ultimately landed here, he called me and said, “Hey, you’ve got to apply for this newly created Deputy Fire Chief position; this is just an amazing community. It’s a great opportunity.” I was very happy where I was and would not even consider it. I just said, “No, thanks. It’s just not for me.” What changed your mind? About six or seven months later, Steve called me again. It was July 9th of last year, and it was 114 degrees in Scottsdale. He said, “I think you’re what we’re looking for—just come out and visit.” He sounded like one of those timeshare salesmen. [laughter] So, we decided to come out for a visit and we arrived on a Thursday and came downtown for Farmers’ Market. My wife and I were holding hands as we turned the corner onto Higuera and saw this absolutely amazing community. We both squeezed each other’s hand at the same time and said, “Oh, wow.” I turned to Steve and asked him, “This happens every Thursday? This isn’t some sort of annual event or something?” He said, “No, this is every Thursday.” That moment was game-changing for us. By Sunday morning we put a bid in on a house here. And, that’s not us. We’re very, very planned, conservative, think-about-things-kind-ofpeople. We absolutely fell in love with SLO. It’s weird; it hit me like a ton of bricks.

Speaking of love, we hear you’ve got a thing going

with Apple Computers… This is going to sound weird, but every time Steve Jobs would give a keynote address announcing new products, my son and I would wait until the weekend and watch it together. We’d talk about how the iPhone has got this new feature or they’re coming out with an iPad. They were usually about an hour-and-a-half long and we would just sit there fully geeked-out watching Jobs talk about the next great thing that was coming out. Both of us kind of preserved it as this intimate father-son thing to do. Neither of us would check online to see what he had announced at the keynote until we could actually watch it together. I can remember my son, as a little boy, sitting on my lap when we were watching it, and then him sitting next to me on the couch as he grew into the shape of a young man. That’s just a great memory for me.

As municipal budgets tighten in cities across the country, fire departments have been scrutinized for their costs, including employee benefits. What

do you say to that? That’s peoples’ right to scrutinize everything. That’s their right. And, you can embrace that, and educate those people—sometimes get them to see your way and sometimes not, but that’s okay. Or you can ignore it, and every assumption they had about you is now correct. So, if we ignore the questions or ignore the relationships, any assumption people would form about this fire department, by our lack of participating in the dialogue, the assumption is that it’s true. It’s like going home and telling your wife, “I think you’re cheating on me.” And she ignores you and walks in the other room, you go, “Oh no, it really is true!” That’s kind of what we have done. We’ve disengaged a little bit.

Switching gears... For many in the community, there remains a feeling of bitterness about your predecessor’s handling of John Ryan Mason, the SLO Firefighter who was rehired after beating someone unconscious in the bathroom at Pappy MacGregors.

What’s your point of view? There will always be a question as to whether the punishment matched the crime. And, I understand that. His discipline here was extremely severe. Financially, he was on leave without pay for 14 months. He was demoted to the lowest step of firefighter. He’s no longer allowed to perform as or be compensated as a paramedic. He is just starting a five-year period of essentially probationary status. The attorney that assisted Chief Hines with the conditions of his return to employment said that in his twentyplus years as a labor attorney for police and fire, he had never seen somebody hired back under those type of conditions—never that severe. We would not have gotten that, I don’t believe, had we gone to court. I really don’t know how Chief Hines could have handled it any better.

So, where does the SLO Fire Department go from

here? Our community expects us to put out fires. And they expect that if they get trapped in a vehicle after an accident that we will cut them out with the Jaws of Life. That’s what we are paid to do; that’s what we are trained to do; that’s what we are equipped to do. But, it’s the little things that always define what is quality service and what is not. For example, if you respond to a call at an elderly woman’s home who has fallen; it’s not just picking her up and putting her on a gurney and sending her on her way to the hospital. It’s holding her hand; it’s cleaning her up; it’s straightening up the room; it’s looking around to see what else you can do; making sure it’s secured. If she’s got a dog, making sure that someone is looking after the dog; it’s talking to the neighbors so they know what’s going on and that she is cared for when she returns. It’s all those things that are almost invisible when they happen that end up resonating with people so much. That’s how I define good service. There are plenty of technically highly competent firefighters and paramedics out there, but none of them can be great if they don’t also have compassion. SLO LIFE