Recently, FIRE CHIEF Editor Glenn Bischoff spoke with Al Gillespie, chief of the North Las Vegas (Nev.) Fire Department and current president of the International Association of Fire Chiefs, about what he hopes to accomplish during his term.

What’s the most important thing on your radar screen right now?
One thing that I’m definitely focused on, and which we’ve been working on for a number of years, is the communications piece. We are keeping close watch on what’s happening in Washington regarding the D Block [the 10 MHz of broadband spectrum in the 700 MHz band]. The IAFC is part of the Public Safety Alliance, and several of our officers, including myself, have testified before Congress. We’re very hopeful that we will be successful in getting the D Block under public safety control.

Why is that important?
When the D.C. was hit by the earthquake in August, all cell service was down. That’s what we want to avoid. It’s important that public safety controls those airwaves, not the private sector. There’s no fallback on this. If we lose the D Block, there is no other spectrum that is available for us for our future communications. Teenagers have access on their phones to better communications technology than first responders have today, and this is our opportunity to change that — and there won’t be another.

What else is on your radar screen?
Today, about 80% of what we do is emergency medical response, and I want to put a focus on helping our members and their fire departments fine-tune their role regarding emergency medical service in their communities. We want to provide them with the information they need to help public officials and their communities understand the fire department’s role in this, and our EMS section is working very hard to establish guidelines for them to follow.

Is this effort designed to keep the private ambulance companies at bay?
Not really. They are good partners for us. They certainly are necessary. The role of the fire department and the private-ambulance sector in terms of emergency medical service varies greatly across the country. In some places, EMS is provided solely by the fire department; in other places, it’s solely provided by private ambulances; and in still other places, it’s a blend. We just want to give communities guidance regarding the different roles so that they can establish what will work best for them. We also want to give our members guidance that will help them decide whether they should go from providing basic life support to advanced life support, and how to make the transition.

Funding is another key challenge facing the fire service today — what do you hope to accomplish in this regard?
One of our major initiatives concerns how to best present our image. Part of what we’re seeing right now is not uncommon when economic times get tough — if you look back historically, this is always when public safety gets blasted. People start to look at firefighter wages or their pension plans, but they forget that these are the people who are putting everything on the line for them. So, our best opportunity is to keep presenting that we always are there for our citizens, that we’re doing all the right things and that we’re good public servants. We need to remind them that we’re not ethically challenged, and that we’re not taking money out of their pockets and using it improperly. So, our image is something that we’re actively working on, and we’ve put together a task force for this purpose.

What do you think it will recommend?
I can’t really say, because the task force only was formed recently. But I think one thing will be to make sure that our members understand that they’re always under the microscope, that anything they do will be presented to the public. I think sometimes people forget that.