2023 Community Connection Award: Brian Brett | Unifying the Wenatchee Valley via fire districts

Brett was born and raised in Wenatchee, with family calling this area home since the 1800s when they homesteaded on Badger Mountain, he said.

A Navy-veteran and certified accountant, Brett started his career in firefighter work back in the '90s as a volunteer and later as a full-time firefighter after three years. Brett has also served as fire investigator.

After the 2008 recession, however, Brett said he considered switching to full-time work as a certified public accountant, which he had done before on a part-time basis at that point.

"It was a difficult period for government entities, and the fire service declined during that time," Brett said. "Fortunately, that was temporary. I am grateful to have persevered during that time of adversity."

He stayed in the fire business as the field had always suited him best.

"Selfishly, it makes me feel good about myself when I can help other people," he said. "The urgency of the situation, the randomness of the 911 calls and the diversity of skills required for the fire service profession is what I really enjoy about the work."

The field has changed during his career and volunteerism has declined nationally in all organizations, including the fire service where it historically has been a major part of the profession, Brett said.

"Our community has an expectation of an urban level of service which places a fire apparatus on-scene within a targeted response time of 4 minutes," he said. "Fire service resources need to be in position to intervene."

And so, when the possibility of the merger became financially tenable in 2022, the fire districts got to work on the merger.

"Gratefully, our predecessors (former commissioners and fire chiefs) set us up for this current success," Brett said. "We are standing on their shoulders."

The merger required a simple majority, 50% plus one, of all combined votes in Chelan and Douglas counties. The final tally was about 57% approval, but a county-to-county look shows that Douglas County residents, about 50.5%, were opposed.

Brett said he thinks that the merger's divisiveness stems from a desire to keep things the same combined with "misinformation" about the merger's financial impacts.

In one way or another, however, the area's dwindling volunteer force could have caused an increase property taxes as fire districts look to hire more career firefighters.

Brett said he recalls at one of the informational meetings on the merger about a handful of citizens who eventually changed their minds regarding the issue.

"They came to the meeting with a bias, thinking this was not the right thing to do ... and were going to validate their conclusion by attending a meeting," he said in an email. "However, what they discovered was complete transparency. Our Fire Commissioners yielded the floor to them to ask all their questions. The group left having changed their minds. In fact, one citizen attended the remainder of our meetings, and her input was included in the adopted merger plan."

Brett said he loves the fire service, but it is a young person's job. He said he intends to transition into the accounting profession in about four years.