"Just sign here …."
THE CITY OF MANASSAS PARK, VIRGINIA, (not to be confused with its neighbor Manassas, Va.) is having some difficulty hiring a permanent fire chief. After their former chief left the post to take another FC job in Texas, they advertised the position opening nationally and received over 40 responses. During the interim while the position was vacant, Deputy Chief Todd Lupton was appointed Acting Chief.
The small city of 14,000 has one fire station that is integrated into the dispatching and response program of the Prince William County emergency services. They have an all-paid FD with eight firefighters per shift operating an engine and a quint.
Manassas Park FRD photo
After narrowing their candidate pool down to five, the selection committee interviewed each of them, but they all withdrew their applications after learning more about the position and what the city manager called the City's "resources." Chief Lupton declined to apply for the position because he was actively pursing his college degree and wanted to retain the time needed to complete it. Also, he lives approx. 50 miles outside the city and had no desire to relocate his residence which is one of the job requirements.
Now the city is back to "square one" and has decided to delay re-advertising the post because they believe that they would mostly just have applications from the same candidate pool. So the solution is to wait for another eight months before opening the position with the expectation that a fresh set of candidates will be applying.
In order to maintain the leadership in the department, they have announced that Chief Lupton is taking the position of Fire Chief for a contractual span of up to one year effective June 14.
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Note: Next door, the City of Manassas is also having its own difficulties finding someone to take their fire chief job. On May 24 Firegeezer reported HERE on their struggles to fill the post.
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