After nine years serving the city of St. Albert, fire chief Ray Richards has retired.
Friday was Richards last official working day on the job. He will come back for one final day at the St. Albert fire department on July 4, which will mark almost 45 years since he began his career as a firefighter in Saskatchewan.
“It was such a great opportunity here and I can’t believe how nine years have passed by,” Richard said. “It’s a great place with great people.”
The city of St. Albert recruited Richards for the position of fire chief but at first he was reluctant to take the job. Although he wanted to get back in the uniform, his son Sean Richards already worked for the St. Albert fire department and didn’t want to interrupt his workplace. Since he was hired he has worked alongside his son for the past nine years.
“It was really an honour to get to come back and be in the uniform. It’s just that sense of being part of an organization that is so well respected and so well received,” Richards said.
Although Richards started his career as a firefighter, he spent time behind a desk for many years.
The fire chief, who is originally from Moose Jaw, began his firefighting career at 21 years old as a crash rescue firefighter at the Regina International Airport. He worked there for seven years before moving on to the Saskatchewan Fire Commissioner’s Office. He spent his time there investigating significant fires across the province.
Richards then made the move with his young family to Alberta to work at the University of Alberta as a fire marshal. He was there from 1984 to 2006 and was eventually promoted to director of environment, health and safety.
Since he started in the fire prevention industry, Richards has seen many changes.
He says that fires are much larger and spread more quickly now than they did when he started as a firefighter. This is due to homes being filled with more easily flammable furniture and changes to construction of new buildings.
“It is more challenging now in the sense that today’s firefighters have to be really smart and knowledgeable about when it is safe to go in,” Richards said.
The technological changes in the industry have also grown by leaps and bounds since he started his career in the 1970s. He said that changes like the new mobile computer automated dispatch have made the job easier for fire departments.
One of Richards’ proudest moments in his career came last year when the St. Albert fire department got accredited through the Commission on Fire Accreditation International program. This required an outside agency to come in and assess the department to see how well it serves the community and if it is meeting the community’s goals and objectives.
At the time they were one of seven Canadian cities with the distinction.
Richards said the designation was the highlight of his time in St. Albert because it validated all of the hard work they had done at the department since he started there.
On Friday, Richards’ wife Elizabeth also retired from her job as executive director at the Edmonton Academy, a private school for students who have been diagnosed with a learning disability.
The two plan on spending time with their six grandkids, travelling and riding their bikes in their spare time.
As for the fire department, there is no replacement yet for the fire chief. For the next few months St. Albert’s three deputy fire chiefs will rotate as acting chief.
The window for fire chief applications closed on Friday and Richards expects a replacement to be in place by July or August.
