West Pierce Fire & Rescue Start Anything but Smooth

The inaugural meeting of the West Pierce Fire & Rescue Board of Commissioners concluded the political technicalities on Tuesday evening at station 21 off Steilacoom Boulevard, but the lead-in told the value of the newly approved merger.

Back-to-back crisis situations involving a train derailment in on Saturday night and a natural gas explosion at the Pierce Transit headquarters in on Monday evening put West Pierce under the microscope. But West Pierce fire chief Ken Sharp said the outcome showed the merger benefits between the neighboring cities.

"All the stations were covered," Sharp said of both situations that alerted the Lakewood and University Place firefighters. "We never lost coverage in either city."

Sharp said today marked the first time both districts worked together in north and south battalions.

"Today was the first day crews were mixed-up," Sharp said.

West Pierce — which is currently divided into Lakewood and University Place fire commissioners —  approved four separate resolutions including the deeds to transfer all real property from District 2 (Lakewood) to District 3 (University Place). Former commissioners, special guests and retirees were honored, and toward the end of the meeting Sharp presented Joe Rodgers, the most-tenured firefighter, with the first West Pierce badge.

Both agencies have been running unilaterally since January. Voters approved the merger on Feb. 8 by more than 80 percent and it was ratified on Feb. 23. What was originally slated to be a smooth transformation resulted in a pair of out-of-the-ordinary response calls.

West Pierce Assistant Chief Operations Paul Tinsley assisted in the natural gas leak explosion yesterday and said the response time was just as good — if not better — because of the new merger. The train derailment marked the first major response by West Pierce, and both incidents were defused with no injuries.

West Pierce Fire & Rescue will celebrate the merger of University Place and Lakewood Fire Departments at 10 a.m. on Friday at the the West Pierce Fire & Rescue headquarters located at 3631 Drexler Drive W. in University Place.