CEO - Steve Strickling - Mansfield Fire Chief

Steve Strickling has worked for the Mansfield Fire Department since 1991. Strickling is in his 10th year as Fire Chief in Mansfield. Steve was born in Mansfield and grew up in the Bellville area. Strickling went to high school at Clear Fork and is a graduate of the University of Akron. Learn about all of the duties of the fire department, training, facilities, staff members and more on the podcast.

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
The CEO you should know, broughtto you by Robie Foster Miller Eric Insurance.
This week CEO Mansfield Fire Chief SteveStrickling. Today we are joined live
in studio by the fire chief inMansfield, Steve Strickling. Steve, good

(00:20):
morning, Thanks for coming in.Good morning, Aaron. Glad to be
here. Yeah, glad to seeyou face to face. I know you
and I will will chat about differentthings that are going on, and glad
we can feature you kind of shota spotlight on the fire department. So
let's begin at the top. Mansfieldhas been around a long time. I'm
sure the fire department has as well. Do we have a ballpark date on

(00:42):
this. Mansfeld Fire Department started charteredin eighteen eighty four. All right,
it's been around quite a while.Yeah, I've been around for a long
long time, serving citizens here inMansfield. How long have you been a
firefighter? How long you've been chiefin Mansfield? Well, I've been chief
for ten years. Prior to that, as an assistant chief for about seven
years, and they've been on thedepartment since June of nineteen ninety one,

(01:06):
so thirty two years this year,all right, thirty two years of service
to Mansfield. Okay, let's kindof do an overview. Let's talk about
some of the duties of a firefighter. People know, hey, there's a
fire, you guys respond, butI know there's EMS and all that.
So could you talk about it's kindof the overall duties of the fire department.
Yeah, So, Number one,our job is to serve people and

(01:29):
help people, and that's what Itell people when they take the job.
Our chief mission is to help peoplein the community. But there's a lot
that goes into that. One ofthe things we do, we spend a
lot of time training. We've trainedalmost on a daily basis. You know,
there's a lot of time keeping ourequipment clean, things like that.
And then then we have our basicfirefighting duties and the EMS duties, which

(01:49):
again knows each have a component oftraining that goes along with each one of
those, and the job has become, you know, highly specialized in the
last fifteen to twenty years. Also, you mentioned keeping equipment clean, but
keeping everything in good working orders sothat when you get that call, you
guys are ready to respond right correct, And one of the one of the
things we do have at the firedepartment also to help us out in that,
and that aim is is we havea mechanic shop where we have two

(02:13):
full time mechanics on duty you're basicallyMonday through Friday, and they keep our
equipment mechanically sound also, so wedon't have to contract that out with other
people. All right, good tohear this morning from the fire chief in
Mansfield, Steve Strickling, this week'sCEO, you should know, all right,
So how many firefighters? Ems?There's a lot of employees. Do

(02:34):
we have a ballpark staff for youguys? As of today, we have
ninety four sworn members. We actuallyhave a retirement so we'll be down to
ninety three tomorrow. Fifty five ishof those members are paramedic level. The
rest of the membership is all tothe level of EMT basic does transporting of
the patients. So but like Isay, fifty five of those are to

(02:58):
the paramedic level. When you talktalk about firefighters, so many and we're
going to go through how many stationsyou have? But so many per station
I would assume firefighters. Yeah,we have anywhere from four to five people
at each station basically except for ourstation on spring Mill Street, which has
three firefighters. A day there,So how many total stations if you would

(03:19):
kind of walk us through that.So we have five stations and number one
central stations down on East third Street. Number two stations on Brookwood Way out
off of Park Avenue. West,Number three stations on Sunset both of our
just off Alexington Avenue. Our numberfour stations our newest station, and it's
at South Maine just south of CookRoad. And then we have Station six,

(03:40):
which is our oldest station, andit's on spring Mill Street across from
Taylor Metal and it only houses oneengine company there. All right, learning
again about the fire department here thismorning. This week's CEO is the fire
chief in Mansfield, Steve Strickling.So somebody may hear that the fire department
is going to respond with mutual aid. Could you walk us through what that

(04:04):
means and how that works. Yeah, So all the departments in the area
work with mutual aide, some variouscapacities that of Some of that is automatic,
some of it is requested. Webasically work off a requested mutuade.
So if a surrounding department, thatbeing Springfield Township, Washington Township, Madison
Township, they have a need forus either MS or fire. They will

(04:28):
call our dispatch center and dispatch usand we'll send them what they're requesting.
And then we also work in viceversa. Now, when it comes to
mutual aid, does it depend onthe level how how big a fire would
be when you would call for mutualaid or not necessarily? How how does
it work? Yeah, I meanit's more of a it's more of a
situation with how many resources do youneed. If we do not have enough
resources, we'll call mutuade in fromthe outside. We've had some fairly large

(04:53):
fires of recent history that we've usedmutualade from some of the surrounding townships.
And again they do the same thingfor us, And that's in the situation
when fire, but we have alot of EMS calls, and if we
are you know, swamped with theMS calls, we'll also call for that
first squad from the outlying townships.You know, talking with police departments,
high with patrol. They work reallywell together here in the Richland County area.

(05:16):
I'm assuming the fire departments as well. Yeah. Oh, over the
past you know, thirty two yearsI've been in the fire service. Our
our relationship in the county and withthe different departments has been very good and
I would say nothing but growing overthe years. That's great to hear again
Mansfield's fire chief Steve Strickling in studiotoday, this week's CEO you should know.

(05:36):
Well, let's step away from workand find out a bit more about
Steve Strickling. Let's go back tothe beginning. If you would tell us
where was Steve Strickling born while Iwas born in Manneste, Ohio, who
grew up in Belleville, Ohio andgraduated from Clarfork High School? All right,
nineteen eighty seven, did not knowyou were a cult? Yeah?
Right, terrific? Tell us spotcollege if you would well. College,

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I started out, did a shortstent at Purdue University, going to study
engineering. Decided I liked a firefightinga lot more from the brief exposure i'd
had to that, and so Imoved back home. I went to the
University of Akron, studied fire scienceunder Professor Hoover up in Akron. I
went on to get a bachelor's degreeso that I could teach fire science basically.

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Then throughout my history here at Mansfield, I've worked in the training office,
did a lot of training for thefire department over the years, and
then I was fortunate enough to alsogo back to school. I got a
second career kind of with my physicianassistant. I did that also and hold
a master's and physician assistant studies throughUniversity of Nebraska, and I do that

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on basically on fridays, I functionedas a physician assistant also, all right,
did not know that? Now?You mentioned going to high school and
then going off to college and thenkind of changing that career path. What
made you want to become a firefighters? There any story behind that? Sure?
So my father was with volunteers downin Belville at Jefferson Township started in

(07:03):
nineteen seventy five. So when Iwas six years old, I basically started
hanging out of the fire station withhim. And when I turned well,
actually right before I turned eighteen yearsold, we had a flood in Belvo
and early July nineteen eighty seven,I think it was the first week of
July, and myself and one ofthe people that I went to high school

(07:27):
with, we basically started helping outat the fire department. And then on
on my eighteenth birthday, which wasthe business meeting night at Belville. I
joined the fire department down in Belothat night, so my eighteenth birthday in
nineteen eighty seven. So all right, terrific to learn the story all about
Steve Strickling this morning. Now,I don't know married kids, if you
would tell us a bit about thefamily. So I've been married thirty years

(07:50):
to my beautiful wife, Heather,and we have three beautiful daughters and they
are all out of the house andgainly employed and we're happy for that.
All right, terrific. Now,being a fire chief, and you mentioned
all the other things you do,I'm sure there's not a lot of spare
time. But when you get sometime away from work, what do you

(08:11):
like to do? Do you haveany hobbies? I like to do a
lot of reading. How do youplay some golf? And my wife and
I have started to really enjoy vacationings, so we take a lot of vacations
if possible, and so that keepsus busy. Yeah, stay busy.
Traveling is fun. Yeah, absolutelygood deal. All right, Well,
let's get back to work for acouple more questions before I let you go.

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Mansfield Fire Chief Steve Strickling, thisweek's CEO, you should know with
us in studio here this morning.So you it's funny. Recently I talk
with Mansfield City Council President David fallCat, and he told me there was
approval for another vehicle for the fireinvestigation. You know, I thought it'd
be good maybe talk about that alittle bit. There's a fire in Mansfield.
Could you talk about how things areinvestigated all those kind of things.

(08:56):
Yeah, So we have a fullystaffed Fire Prevention Bureau which handles all of
our fire investigations, It handles allof our fire inspections, and it handles
all of our public safety education.So when I say fully staffed, it
has three sworn firefighters. And thenwe have an administrative assistant now that handles
scheduling for all those tasks. Sothe investigations, basically, if we have
a fire, we have our dispatchcenter, contact one of the investigators.

(09:18):
They come to the scene, doa preliminary investigation. Many times, if
it's dark, they can come backthe next day, get some daylight,
and we spend some time looking lookingover the fire scene, possibly involve an
engine company to help them out digdig through the debris. Because investigating the
fire is kind of complicated because mostof the evidence is all burned up.

(09:39):
So if we think that there's somesuspicion to the fire or something like that,
and we suspect arson, and weinvolved the police department also, and
we've worked really well with the detectivesand a detective bureau. And that's basically
how we handle our investigations. Now, somebody may here, and I have
the question, somebody may here,you have to calling the State Fire Marshal's

(10:01):
office. How does that work whenyou have to have to reach out?
So we don't do that very oftenbecause our investigators are trained to the level
that we feel very competent with ourinvestigations. However, we do notify the
state if we have fatalities of civilians. Unfortunately that does happen. They most
times let us handle and conduct theinvestigation. Sometimes, if we're you know,

(10:24):
we have a very large fire,very large loss, we may involve
them just a second set of eyes. Basically, all right, terrific to
learn about everything the fire department doeshere in Mansfield. We have the fire
chief in studio this morning, SteveStrinkling. So as we learn about the
department and all the things you do. I just wanted to bring up a

(10:45):
couple more things you mentioned training andall those kind of things. What if
somebody here's your voice and wonders arethey hiring at the fire department right now?
And how how does that work?Yeah, so we're oftentimes in a
constant state of hiring. However,the way that works we use the civil
service system, So we do testing. We test approximately every two years.
Hopefully we can make a list lastfor two years, and in recent times

(11:09):
we've only been able to make ahiring list last for about eighteen months maximum.
We've been testing approximately every eighteen months. But we'll give a well advertise.
We'll give a civil service test.Basically, anybody over the age of
eighteen can take that test. Youcan come in, we go through a
background investigation process, once you passthe test, and then we hire you.
And if you need training, wesend you to the State Fire Academy

(11:31):
for training and then we'll put youonline. How long does the training roughly
take for that? So the initialtraining for firefighter is a two hundred and
forty hour class and for an EMTBasic, which is also a requirement,
you have to have about one hundredand twenty hours of training through that.
While I have you here. Weare basically work on our way toward may
overall calls for service, whether it'sa fire, whether it's ems transport.

(11:56):
You were telling me those numbers havebeen up, correct, they have been.
Last year we ended up twelve twohundred calls for service, which was
a three point to six percent increaseover the year before that, and that
seems to be two to three percentseems to be the number that we're climbing
each year. I'm hoping that thattaper's off here soon. But as the
population ages, it seems like wetend to get more calls, especially in

(12:18):
that realm of VMS. Well cheap. Before I let you go this morning,
it's been great to learn about youall the great work you do with
the Mansfield Fire Department. If somebodyhears your voice and they have a question,
you know, they want to getahold of you. Maybe they want
to find out more about the CivilService exam, how it works, How
can they get in touch with theMansfield Fire Department, whether it's a phone

(12:39):
call, go online, or whetherthey stop in at an office in town.
So my email and phone number formyself in my office is listed on
the city's website. But also Imean if you just want to call and
talk to me for some reason,call my assistant A Lisa down at the
number one fire station for one nineseventy five five nine eight one four,

(13:00):
and she's very versed in getting ahold of me and she can answer most
of your questions, probably just fromher experience here at the fire department.
Yeah, I can say she's great. If I have any question, I
email her and you get a responseright back. She's very very good.
Yeah. Awesome. Well, Chief, it's been great to learn about you
and again all the good work youguys do here locally. Mansfield Fire Chief

(13:22):
Steve Strickling, this week's CEO,you should know we appreciate you coming in
learning about you continued success. Thanksfor being here today, Thanks for having
me here. Mansfield Fire Chief SteveStrickling, Thus CEO you should know rita
bio, see a photo and hearthe extended interview at WMA NFM dot com.
Leading means having a vision and sharingit with others. I'm John Robi

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of RF and ME Insurance. We'reexcited to bring you this program featuring CEOs
from our area who will share thethoughts on what it means to work and
live in north central Ohio,