Chief Bill Peterson of the Plano (Texas) Fire Department and Fire Chief's 2000 Career Fire Chief of the Year has been elected international president of the Institution of Fire Engineers for the 2004-2005 term. Peterson is the first American and only the third non-Brit to hold the office in the 85-year history of the organization. Fire Chief recently spoke with him about the IFE and his new role in it.

FC: What are the current goals of the IFE?

Peterson: One of the biggest would be expanding the number of members in the organization in the engineering council division. The IFE in the United Kingdom is the organization that's responsible for ensuring qualifications for fire protection engineers. A secondary goal would be to provide more support worldwide to the growth that we've seen in membership in countries outside of the United Kingdom.

We're going through a transformation to more of a business corporate model, and so we're changing over to a board of directors which has 12 members on it and a general assembly which is made up of individual representatives from each of the branches all over the world. So it's a little bit of a different sort of organization. In July, we'll complete the transformation. With almost 50% of the membership being outside the United Kingdom, the international council felt it was time to move to a corporate business model for the 21st century.

FC: What do you attribute the recent growth to?

Peterson: Other countries have looked to the IFE historically as being a very prestigious organization and because of the influence in other countries, particularly under the British Commonwealth. The IFE has been the primary organization that's led to increased professional development in a lot of those countries. In the last 10 or 15 years in particular that growth has spread outside of the British Commonwealth countries. The United States is a good example; Iceland is another example, as are Belgium and Germany. We're looking at establishing a branch in Spain probably in the next few months and also looking to expand into South America. The IFE has a worldwide reputation of being a very high-quality membership, services-oriented organization.

FC: As you are the first American and only the third non-British person to hold this office in 85 years, do you expect your presidency to bring increased focus to the American branch?

Peterson: I think my election to president was probably two-fold. The organization over the last almost 10 years has been a principal sponsor of the U.K./U.S. Symposium, and I gained some fairly substantial recognition and visibility within the United Kingdom because of my roll in bringing together the symposium since 1995.… I think the timing was right for an individual who's seen as more international than strictly just British.

We're a relatively young branch here in the United States. The branch was established in 1996, so we're not even 10 years old, but we already have a reputation worldwide as being a very active branch and a rapidly growing branch. … I think as an American I can help create an image that in fact the organization has completed its transformation and is committed to growth worldwide.

FC: With the increased focus on homeland security in the United States, what do you think the international community can offer as advice to American fire officers?

Peterson: We have colleagues in Northern Ireland, for example, who have dealt with terrorism for a number of years; we can learn from their experience, learn from their failures and make our system a lot more effective while not having to go through the same learning curve.

I think that sometimes we think we have all of the solutions for the problems that we face, and in many instances it's an issue of we don't know what we really don't know. By dealing with other fire service professionals worldwide, it tends to broaden our view and understanding of problems that others have had that we're just now beginning to face.

FC: What's the IFE's most important responsibility?

Peterson: I feel pretty strongly that the IFE has somewhat of a unique opportunity to unite fire engineering professionals all over the world to improve the level of safety in both developed countries such as the United Kingdom and the United States, and also developing countries worldwide.

One of the concepts that we've talked about, particularly in the last 12 months, is that fire protection and public safety and emergency management do provide a basic foundation for democracy. A lot of our efforts in the IFE are developed or are geared toward improving the infrastructure in those developing third-world countries that we hope to develop a government patterned after that of the U.K. or the United States.