Fire Prevention Officers Association

Dennis Mathisen, President Northern Division

Karyn Vaudreuil, President Southern Division

Annual Membership Meeting

Buellton Marriott 

President Mathisen called the March 18, 2005 general membership meeting to order at 1115 hours at the Santa Ynez Marriott in Buellton, California.

Sam Husoe led the pledge of allegiance.

President Mathisen recognized the visiting Fire Chiefs, Past Presidents and Building Officials.

President Mathisen asked Past President Tonya Hoover to declare a quorum, so declared.

SFM Report

SFM Ruben Grijalva provided the membership with a SFM Report outlining his office’s top priorities, including better communication; update State Fire Training; Fireworks enforcement issues including looking at some current bills that are being proposed regarding safe disposal; WUI building standards – Kate Dargan and Ethan Foote are the co-chairs of the committee and are working on getting the proposed standards to the BSC; and working on the code adoption issue – with the recent reversal of the decision to adopt the NFPA codes he will be working with all the appropriate parties to move forward with the adoption of the codes.

Lorin Neyer asked the SFM what the next steps will be – SFM Grijalva indicated that his office will need to start developing a strategy on how to move forward, get clear direction from the BSC, and develop some committees to start working on the process.

President Mathisen made the offer to the SFM that the association is very willing to help with whatever his office needs to help with their priorities.

Legislative Report

Gene Gantt provided a Legislative Report to the membership. There are approximately 180 bills being proposed to the California Legislature. He gave an overview of the bills we are working on, including the Ortiz bill for sprinklers in residential care facilities, Blue Ribbon Commission proposals, fireworks, fire safe cigarettes, etc. The legislative committee may be asking for people to help with going to Sacramento as needed to help either support or oppose bills. 

Workshop Committee Report

Attendance is up this year, with 190 paid attendees. The contract with the hotel is up in 2006, and the workshop committee signed another 3 year contract up to and including 2009. 

Committee reports

Christina Jamison gave report for Fire Code, Building Standards, and Hazmat committees:

• Hazardous Materials is working on Hydrogen regulation

• Building Standards has been working on R-2 handbook

• Fire Code is working on adult daycare regs, and the Fire Code adoption

No one present for Fire Equipment and Devices Committee

Robert Nolan gave the Fire Service Education overview of upcoming classes:

• Sprinkler classes in the south in April and June

• Fire Alarm class in May

• Working on egress class

• Joint north-south marketing class being worked on

• Statutes and regulations class may be coming up in south

• 2 day IFC class including certification is being worked on

Penni Overstreet-Murphy gave overview of things they are working on:

• More free materials on the website

• Juvenile firesetter classes are upcoming, levels 1 & 2 from NFA

• Working on coalitions

Don Oakes gave overview of Wildland Urban Interface meeting:

• Went over goals of north and south

• North is working on Wildland inspector certification classes

Karyn Vaudreuil gave overview for the Investigation Committee since no co-chairs were present. She discussed that CCAI has approached our organization about doing some things together.

Special Presentation

President Vaudreuil gave special thank you to Wes Arvin and Laura Blaul for their efforts over the past year to bring the north and the south closer together.

Page Dougherty and Kevin Scott presented the Nor Cal FPO’s with an ICC Chapter banner, President pins and Past President pins. So Cal FPO’s had been presented with a Chapter banner at a previous meeting.

Tonya Hoover gave the count from the banquet for attendance – and it was a tie!!, 70 from the north and 70 from the south. Theresa Johnson recommended we take the count from this meeting, obviously she hadn’t counted first because the south won by a count of 21 to 20. President Mathisen passed the gavel to President Vaudreuil.

The meeting was adjourned at 1215 hours

Respectfully submitted,

Theresa Johnson, Secretary Northern Division