The City of Arlington Fire Department and North County Fire & EMS are excited to announce a partnership to provide additional services to the residents and businesses in Arlington and North County Fire’s service area. With the approval of the recent partnership agreement, the City of Arlington is hiring a Deputy Chief - Medical Services Administrator, and North County Fire & EMS is hiring an Assistant Chief for Community Risk Reduction (Fire Marshal).
The Deputy Chief – Medical Services Administrator, supervising the day to day emergency medical services programs of both agencies, will be filled by Chris Dickison. Deputy Chief Dickison was selected through a competitive process. He is a 19+ year employee of the City of Arlington, serving as a paramedic since 2002. Prior to joining Arlington Fire, Deputy Chief Dickison worked as an EMT with Cascade Valley Hospital. Arlington Fire assumed the provision of the EMS services from Cascade Valley Hospital on May 1, 1999. Deputy Chief Dickison’s first day in the position will be March 18, 2019. He will be formally sworn in at the March 18 Arlington City Council meeting beginning at 7:00 p.m.
The Assistant Chief for Community Risk Reduction (Fire Marshal), supervising community risk reduction, fire prevention and investigation activities for both agencies, will be filled by Mike Makela. Assistant Chief Makela was selected through a competitive process. He joins North County Fire & EMS after serving three years with the Spokane Valley Fire Department as the Deputy Fire Marshal and eight and one half years with the Snohomish County Fire Marshal’s Office as a Fire Investigator. He was formally sworn in at the March 13, 2019 North County Fire &EMS Commission meeting.
North County Fire and EMS Chief John Cermak stated, “North County and Arlington Fire continue to explore partnerships and innovative solutions to improve efficiency and service delivery. These new positions shared between our agencies are just one way that our partnership has enhanced the services we provide.”
Arlington Fire Chief Dave Kraski said, “This is a remarkable opportunity for our departments to jointly provide additional services to our communities that we would not be able to do on our own.”