Northwest Fire District (NWFD) is a community fire and emergency services provider serving northwest Tucson, including parts of Marana, Oro Valley, and unincorporated Pima County. Formed in 1983, the district’s mission is to save lives, protect property, and care for the community through all-risk emergency response, including fire suppression, advanced life support EMS, hazardous-materials response, and technical rescue. Beyond emergencies, NWFD emphasizes prevention through inspections, code compliance, and public safety education. Operating from multiple strategically located stations and governed by an elected five-member board, the district covers more than 150 square miles of suburban, rural, and wilderness areas. NWFD is internationally accredited and focuses on continuous improvement in training, operations, and community risk reduction to provide reliable, high-quality service to tens of thousands of residents and businesses.
This organization has been a good place to work until the past several years. Great guys, good trucks, plenty of training and good equipment. Recently there has been ample opportunities for leadership to support the firemen in the field which have come up empty.
Union has pushed for changes, especially for scheduling to change from 3/4 to 48/96 (this was voted on three times, all in favor of the 48/96) then arbitrarily overruled by a Chief or Chiefs, since we have 17 of them. That is a factual number, NWFD has 17 Chief level positions. Little to no support for the members, only broad sweep, knee jerk reactions to incidents that “harm the department”. Disciplinary actions vary based upon your popularity and position. Guys have been hung out to dry, penalized or terminated in order to “save face”, with no support.
Great guys in the field, terrible leadership up top, led by a Fire Chief that seems to be jockeying for position within local governance and focused more on “relationships with local partners” rather than listening to his own guys and supporting them and their needs when asked to do so.
NWFD has completely lost sight of what really matters, the men and women who keep the department running.
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1 Reviews on “Northwest Fire District”
This organization has been a good place to work until the past several years. Great guys, good trucks, plenty of training and good equipment. Recently there has been ample opportunities for leadership to support the firemen in the field which have come up empty.
Union has pushed for changes, especially for scheduling to change from 3/4 to 48/96 (this was voted on three times, all in favor of the 48/96) then arbitrarily overruled by a Chief or Chiefs, since we have 17 of them. That is a factual number, NWFD has 17 Chief level positions. Little to no support for the members, only broad sweep, knee jerk reactions to incidents that “harm the department”. Disciplinary actions vary based upon your popularity and position. Guys have been hung out to dry, penalized or terminated in order to “save face”, with no support.
Great guys in the field, terrible leadership up top, led by a Fire Chief that seems to be jockeying for position within local governance and focused more on “relationships with local partners” rather than listening to his own guys and supporting them and their needs when asked to do so.
NWFD has completely lost sight of what really matters, the men and women who keep the department running.