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Clearwater's next fire chief has been hired. Jamie Geer, the 50-year-old interim fire chief in Franklin, Tenn., is said to be a natural leader who stays calm in a storm and can build a sense of teamwork in the troops.
He will need those skills, and more, to lead Clearwater's fractured and much-criticized department to the next level.
On Sept. 1, Geer will assume the top job in a fire department that had a leadership vacuum in recent years, where the local union had been allowed too much power over department policy and procedures, where the personnel had too little training in some important areas of firefighting and where the rank and file firefighters and paramedics are at odds with city administrators over money and management.
Geer can't say he wasn't warned. He and other finalists for the job met with both the current chief, retiring Rowland Herald, and union president John Lee. City Manager Bill Horne went to Tennessee to meet with Geer and question those who have worked with him during his tenure there. Web sites and Internet chat rooms used by firefighters around the country have recorded the problems in the Clearwater department ever since a fatal 2002 condominium fire exposed the department's shortcomings and led to a series of investigations.
Geer also has had a convenient source of information about the community of Clearwater: his wife, Merinda. Her family used to vacation in Treasure Island. She is familiar with Pinellas County, and a few years ago even put Clearwater at the top of a list of places she would like to live someday.
Geer's to-do list will be a long one. He will need to quickly establish himself as a strong and capable administrator and rebuild discipline in a department that has lacked it for too long. He will need to review the department's leadership ranks and make changes where there are weaknesses. He will have to make judgments about the training and abilities of all department personnel and decide whether to hire new people. Perhaps he even will be able to build a relationship with union members that will bring an end to the contract dispute.
It is helpful that Geer has firefighting experience, which Herald did not have when he took over Clearwater's department, that he also has been a union leader and that he has worked in fire departments in three states. He knows how fire departments are supposed to work.
Geer ultimately not only has to lead those who work in the Fire Department, he has to restore the public's confidence in the department's ability to fight fires and conduct itself professionally.