San Antonio Report
by Iris Dimmick
January 18, 2024

For the first time in 17 years, the City of San Antonio is looking to hire a new fire chief after Charles Hood was forced to retire earlier this month.

Last week, the city announced Deputy Chief Christopher Monestier would serve as interim chief while the search and interview processes proceed. The city indicated the job would be posted online for applications by the end of February.

“A national search for a permanent Fire Department Chief will commence immediately,” City Manager Erik Walsh said in a statement announcing Hood’s sudden retirement after an investigation found he made inappropriate comments about women. “The search will contemplate internal and external applicants.”

The City Manager’s Office declined to share more details about the hiring process while staff is still working on what that will entail, according to a spokesperson. Ultimately, the city manager appoints department heads and that appointment is then confirmed by the City Council, per the city’s charter and state law.

“It’s been a while, so they kind of have to dust it off,” Joe Jones, president of the San Antonio Professional Firefighters Association, told the San Antonio Report on Tuesday. The city seems “extremely open” to incorporating feedback from union membership, which includes nearly all firefighters and paramedics.

Monestier and Valerie Frausto, who was named interim deputy fire chief, are both union members, Jones said. Frausto is only the second woman to hold that rank in SAFD history, according to the department.

“I have faith that they’ll be responsible custodians and that they’ll serve San Antonio firefighters and paramedics to the best of their ability,” Jones said.

In a statement released days after Hood retired, the fire union indicated that there were “numerous allegations made against Mr. Hood’s administration …[who] were all chosen by Mr. Hood and represent a direct reflection of Mr. Hood’s influence, character, standards, and culture.”

‘This isn’t the old days’

Hood, who moved from Phoenix to lead SAFD, retired on Jan. 3.

In 2020, Hood was named the Metropolitan Fire Chiefs Association’s Chief of the Year. During his SAFD career, he oversaw the establishment of employee wellness programs, the department’s Mobile Integrated Healthcare Program and led the department to international accreditation.

Also in 2020, Hood was reprimanded for posing for a photo with a woman hired to lie on a table as sushi was served from her body.

In December, the city hired a labor and employment attorney to investigate a November allegation that Hood had made inappropriate comments.

“Chief Hood admitted he used the phrase ‘p**** always wins’ within the SAFD, and last used the phrase this year; and admitted he used the phrase … with male SAFD personnel,” according to a summary of the attorney’s report.

Unlike the 2020 infraction, the city took a zero-tolerance stance.

“His comments are vulgar, demeaning and disrespectful to women,” Walsh wrote in a statement on Jan. 3. “They are disruptive to professional operations of the department. This conduct will not be tolerated.”

Of the city’s 1,786 career firefighters and paramedics employed as of last week, 100 were women; that’s about 5.6%. In 2020 5%, or 89, of SAFD’s 1,757 uniformed employees were women.

That tracks with national statistics from the U.S. Fire Administration: in 2020 9% of all U.S. firefighters are women, including 5% of all career firefighters, 11% of volunteer firefighters and 12% of wildfire firefighters.

Incidents that disparage women within fire departments can make recruitment and retention of women firefighters even harder, said Rachael Staebell, vice president of the International Association of Women in Fire & Emergency Service, known as Women in Fire.

“It’s hard sometimes when cases pop up around the country that make you go: ‘Really?'” said Staebell, a firefighter and paramedic in Colorado Springs, who declined to comment on Hood’s case specifically.

Similar incidents across the country “have forced fire departments to wake up and say: ‘This isn’t the old days, man.’ … But the beauty is we also have a lot of fire departments around the country that recognize that they want to be elite, they want to get the best service possible.

“Those are the places that don’t have trouble recruiting, they don’t have trouble retaining because they value their people,” she said.

The key to finding the best chief in 2024, Staebell said, “to look for someone that has their foundation in valuing and respecting, making a fire department that is a team … and really just [someone who is] not BS’ing right off the bat.”

A chief should be able to keep their eyes forward to the future, she added. “The fire service is changing exponentially every day. And the challenges we face are not just safety challenges, they’re cultural challenges.”

Seeking SAFD culture change

Jones, who has had complaints lodged against him and bouts with Hood’s administration, ran unopposed to lead the union for a second term that started last week. He said the sexist behavior exhibited by Hood is not pervasive throughout the rank-and-file.

“That’s a natural concern,” he said. “But there’s been a disconnect between Charles Hood and his administration and San Antonio firefighters and paramedics that has been alive for years. They don’t accurately represent us.”

Firefighter Emily Leffler, communications director for the fire union, said she does not feel discriminated against by her peers.

“I’ve been on crews with all guys my whole career and … I trust them absolutely with my life — and I think they also would say the same about me,” Leffler said. “As long as you are capable of doing the job, nobody’s going to give you any trouble. … I think this is absolutely an administration problem and has nothing to do with the culture of the crews and the boots on the ground.”

The next chief, of course, needs to be a leader, Jones said, “but it’s going to take innovation, strategy, patience [and] familiarity. They’re going to have to be a motivator. Whoever the next fire chief is really has their work cut out for them because they’re inheriting, structurally, a very capable, competent department — but organizationally, a very unhealthy department.”

There are pros and cons for both internal and external candidates, he said.

Staebell agreed.

“There’s some places that have had phenomenal internal candidates that have truly grown up and been raised in the system they are in and then there [are] people that can come from out of town and really make a big difference,” she said.

“… No chief wants to come into a place and have to feel like the outsider, but change is hard .. and change honestly starts at the top,” she said. “You’ve got to set the tone.”