Hello, My name is Mike Crawley. I am Chief Of the Richmond Fire Department.

I am very pleased to have this opportunity to share with you some of the accomplishments made by your fire department in the year 2007.

The fire department held our 37 th Fire Department Memorial Service in May in honor of those firefighters that gave their lives in the line of duty.

The fire prevention division conducted 455 inspections and found 329 violations. They made 60 re-inspections and 250 violations were corrected. They responded to 17 complaints, instructed 68 educational programs and conducted 24 investigations.

In October the fire department, as always, hosted a number of activities for fire prevention week. Mayor Hutton issued a proclamation to start off the week. The Fire prevention Bureau set up car seat safety checks and replace outdated models they also gave away smoke detectors and batteries while the local union served lunch. There were inspections of fire extinguishers and safety materials were issued. All fire stations were open for tours, the smoke house was available for instruction and Patches the Fire Dog entertained the children.

The Training division instructed 50 hours per man of required OSHA training, 320 hours per man for the recommended Insurance Service Offices training and the 3 probationary firefighters we have also received 240 hours per man of recruit training. In addition to the mandated training the division also conducted training for Fire Officers, Hazardous Materials and bio terrorism training, Confined Space Rescue, Building Construction, Driver Operator, Scene Security and preservation, Dive Training and Report Writing. The Emergency Medical Training consisted of patient care, EMS reports and numerous other subjects.

The emergency response division responded to 4,110 emergency calls, which were comprised of a variety of different types of emergencies. Our firefighters are trained for many different types of situations and are very skilled to mitigate the many emergencies that they encounter.

The Richmond Fire Department is pleased to serve our community and look forward to continuing to improve on the services we render and I am honored to serve as your Fire Chief. Thank you!