Kelowna has looked to Vernon to fill its fire chief's position.
Jeff Carlisle (pictured) will become the Kelowna Fire Department's leader January 4th, taking over for the departed Rene Blanleil. Carlisle has been Vernon's chief for about two and a half years, and tells KISS FM, he was called about the vacant job. "My interest started back in August when I knew the position was available and their selection process kicked in. I was actually contacted by the executive search firm to see if I was interested, so it all lined up for us." Carlisle says he felt privileged to run the Vernon department, adding his leaving doesn't reflect anything negative about the city. "There's been a lot of improvements here, and the folks in this department supported me, so it wasn''t an issue of me being unhappy." He will be moving to a department that is more than double the size, with 117 staff and 59 volunteers. Vernon has a combined 90 paid and volunteer members.Vernon's chief administrative officer Leon Gous says Carlisle's tenure as Vernon's chief was brief, but "he maintained a concerted effort to improve fire and emergency response services to all citizens of Vernon." Vernon's deputy chief administrative officer Marg Baily says they will start the recruitment process for a new chief right away, but it may take longer than January 4th to fill the position. Bailey tells KISS FM, "We will certainly do our best to get the ads out as soon as possible and start the recruitment process. If not (able to fill it by Jan 4th), we'll be working with the deputy fire chief (Lawrie Skolrood) and the administrator to see how we would manage in the short interim should be not be able to fill it prior to Jeff's departure." Carlisle is not sure if the city will want his input on who should become the new chief. Paul Macklem from the City of Kelowna says 90 people applied for the Kelowna job from across Canada.
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