Fire

Fire Chief's Message

South Lake Tahoe Fire Rescue is an all-risk Fire Department serving the citizens of South Lake Tahoe. We currently provide Advanced Life Support Paramedic Engine companies from two Fire Stations in the City. Those Engines are staffed with a Captain, Engineer and Firefighter/Paramedic. Through the support of our City Council and the Community we are planning to reopen Fire Station 2 later this year or early 2020 with a cross staffed truck and engine company to better serve the Al Tahoe area of South Lake Tahoe. This additional staffing will improve public safety, firefighter safety, response times, as well as the overall operation of the fire department.

The mission statement of SLTFR is to serve our community with compassion, professionalism and honor. In addition to our mission statement we identified our top 3 daily priorities. The first is to provide excellent customer service on every event that we respond to. We are also committed to training our personnel every day. Lastly, we have committed ourselves to maintaining a high level of fitness in order to serve the community and maintain their investment in us.

Aside from our commitment to the City of South Lake Tahoe we are also involved in the regional area as well as at the state level. Through the Lake Tahoe Regional Fire Chiefs Association we have agreements in place for immediate mutual aid during large events. This allows all fire departments in the Tahoe Basin as well as partners immediately adjacent to share resources at a moment’s notice. Beyond our regional boundaries SLTFR is also a cooperator at the State level by way of the State’s Master Mutual Aid Agreement. It is through this agreement that we are able to send resources all over the state as well as into Nevada to large wildfire events. Last year our personnel responded to several out of county wildfires including the deadly Camp Fire in Butte County.

As a direct result of the catastrophic fires in the last several years SLTFR is partnering with all south shore police and fire agencies to address fuel reduction, evacuation plans as well as initial response to any fire that would threaten the south shore. This has been an ongoing effort and will continue to be a high priority for SLTFR.

SLTFR also recognizes that we have a responsibility to plan and project the emergency needs of the City and adapt to changes in the built environment as well as the challenges brought on by climate change. To that end we have built a business plan to address the immediate fiscal needs to manage our budget responsibly. We have also built a strategic plan which has outlined the direction of the fire department and how we intend to maintain and/or improve our service level to the city. And lastly we were able to complete an exhaustive Standards of Cover document in the Fall of 2018 which looks at the makeup of the City in an objective way. Through this document the City Council was able to make informed decisions about the level of fire protection within our city and determine what our acceptable risk is. This document is available on the website and we encourage our citizens to read it.

SLTFR would like to thank our City Manager, City Council and our Citizens for their tireless support. It is truly our honor to serve this community.

Interim Fire Chief Jim Drennan