Portland Has a New Fire Chief

Portland Fire and Rescue has a new chief and, for the first time in a long time, it is not someone from within the department.

Commissioner Dan Saltzman, who oversees the bureau, announced the city has hired Mike Myers, the retired chief of the Las Vegas department to take the reins here.

Myers, left Vegas in 2013 after 26-years with the department and went on to work as fire chief in St. Charles, Missouri.

He succeeds Erin Janssens, who had spent her whole career in Portland. She had taken over from John Klum who had taken over for Dave Sprando. All were pretty much Portland Fire and Rescue lifers.

Saltzman made the selection after the Bureau of Human Resources had taken the 31 applicants and narrowed the field to ten.

From those ten, a pale including the president of the fire union turned the ten into a list of five.

Myers begins work June 30th.