As most of you know, Chief Steve McClintock has resigned. He came here from Oregon with the plan of his family to shorty follow behind him.  A slight change of plans happened when they discovered one of their daughters was going to make them grandparents!  Chief McClintock had already accepted the job here and moved to California, but not the rest of his family. His lovely wife Marla had a hard choose to make, but ultimately stayed behind to help her daughter and of course, enjoy grandmother time.

Chief McClintock quickly became part of the Mi Wuk family.  We aren’t the best substitute family, but now he was stuck with us and he was going to have to learn to like it! He put in 2 years here at the fire station, and so much has changed, from new friendships at the fire house, to friendships throughout the county. We have good working relationships with neighboring agencies and everyone is playing nice in the sandbox.  Besides the upgraded apparatus, the most notable change in my opinion is our staffing level. We can effectively do our jobs with the number of firefighters we have now. Without going to into all the things he has done for the fire department, or the District, I can tell you that our “5 year plan” was almost completely accomplished in his 2 years!

Now, it has come to the point where Chief McClintock needed to be home with his family. Developments in the McClintock family made the choice to go home impossible to put off any longer.  He really wanted, and needed to go back home to his family.  He loved Mi Wuk, but apparently we didn’t match up to his wife and daughters back home .   We all hated to see him leave, but all understood that it needed to happen.

To follow behind him, I was voted in from the position of Battalion Chief to Interim Chief, then eventually as permanent Chief. Chief McClintock mentored me from the first day he started to prepare me for the position. He believed strongly in preparing the person below for the position above. This is a great tactic for successful infrastructure, and made for a flawless transition.  It is a position I swore to never put myself in, but then my mind was changed.  Helping Chief these last couple of years has been eye opening. I want to keep our department moving forward to better serve our community.  It’s challenging, mostly because of our budget, but it’s a fun challenge. We have community support unlike I’ve seen in the other departments I have worked for. This community is amazing.  After starting here as a Captain in 2012, my wife and I decided to move up here from Sonora/Tuttletown area.  The house we bought is 2 minutes from the fire station.  Not a bad commute!

I want the community to know they are always welcome to stop by or call for anything.  This is your Fire District and we want to know what we can do to better improve our services to you. “Open door policy” as McClintock would say, is still our policy.

Well, maybe that’s on pause for now… a phone call works best.  Let’s keep that 6’distancing!

For some quick news and I’ll stop babbling:

Burn permits not required until May 1st.Please obtain your burn permits online for we will NOT be issuing them until the coronavirus threat winds down.  Use link below for obtaining permits.

https://burnpermit.fire.ca.gov/apply-for-a-permit/

Thank you, Chief James Klyn