By QUINTON SMITH/YachatsNews.com
SEAL ROCK – The Seal Rock Fire District board voted 3-1 Wednesday to hire the former fire chief in Toledo to manage the department until it can find a new chief to replace the one they fired last week.
The district will pay Will Ewing $3,500 a month to oversee the district as a consultant and have firefighter Derrick Odoutch, who they promoted to captain Wednesday, handle day-to-day operations.
Wednesday’s vote was the same as the one last Thursday that put fire chief Tom Sakaris on 30 days paid leave and then terminate his contract.
Voting no during both meetings was Tina Fritz. Board member Dustin Joll, who is a paramedic with Newport-based LifeFlight, abstained during the vote to dismiss Sakaris and submitted his resignation before Wednesday’s meeting.
Ewing comes with some baggage – which several people questioned during the board’s special meeting – and which he addressed during a short presentation on his plans.
Lincoln County Sheriff’s deputies arrested Ewing on Sept. 16 after a fight with his wife at their home in Toledo. Tina Ewing accused him of trying to strangle her during an argument. He is charged with strangulation, fourth-degree assault and menacing during domestic violence and has a court appearance scheduled later this month.
Ewing, 64, has been working under a contract since December 2018 as chief of the all-volunteer Idanha-Detroit Rural Fire Protection District in the Santiam canyon area east of Salem. In June 2018 Ewing was fired as chief in Toledo after 19 years there after a disagreement with an interim city manager, who was then let go a year later.
Sakaris came to Seal Rock in 2015 from California to become chief. In the past few years he has struggled with some members of the public and board members – now a majority — with a transition from a large volunteer organization to one with four paid firefighters handling calls. Much of that disagreement came because Sakaris insisted that volunteers get state certifications, which many were unable or unwilling to do. That led to most dropping out of the volunteer program.
Ewing told the board he is adept at recruiting volunteers, having built a large cadre of them first in Toledo and then at Idanha-Detroit.
“I think we can create that,” he said. “There’s lots of people who can help Seal Rock … and Waldport for that matter.”
The Seal Rock and Central Oregon Coast Fire & Rescue District have an agreement to share personnel and equipment to respond to calls in both their service areas.
Ewing, board chair Al Anton and board member Paul Rimola endorsed the agreement, with Anton saying “without the IGA we’d have no service.”
Draws some objections
Two audience members and board member Fritz, who joined the meeting mid-way by telephone because she was working, questioned Ewing’s hiring because of his domestic violence arrest. One of those audience members was Fritz’s husband, Wes Fritz.
“I’m concerned with the board hiring someone with these charges,” said Wes Fritz. “… you’re paying him to represent this organization.”
Former fire chief Paul Highfill, who has been active in endorsing Anton and new board members opposed to Sakaris, said he talked with Ewing.
“He was very open with me,” Highfill said. “I’m satisfied.”
Ewing said he would end the contract on his own if convicted of any charges.
“This is the first time I’ve gotten in any trouble,” he said. “I’m not playing it down.”
Tina Fritz said argued that contracting with Ewing was “unethical and not moral” while the domestic violence charges are pending.
“He has admittedly strangled his wife,” she said. “In any other time and in any other place he’d be on administrative leave.”
Ewing’s plans
The district has a 2021-22 general fund budget of $607,000 and in addition to a chief, four paid firefighters and a budgeted position of a part-time office assistant.
Ewing told the board that he would work part-time along with his chief’s job in Idanha-Detroit. He said the fire board there knows of his domestic violence arrest and his consulting job with Seal Rock.
“I will not be able to provide you with even close to 40 hours in the office per week,” he said in a two-page proposal to the board, but said he will work both in the office and remotely on administration, pending insurance issues, the budget, firefighter safety and recruiting volunteers.
In a cover letter to the proposal, Ewing said he was not up to speed on the agreement with COCF&R but that “Seal Rock needs to be able to stand on his own feet and professionally mitigate incidents within the district.”
“Not to remotely suggest that we forego requesting mutual aid and share resources,” he wrote, but “… to rely on outside assistance is extremely counter-productive to establishing any internal morale in Seal Rock.”
Ewing said he wanted to help Seal Rock because of commitment to fire safety organizations the past 40 years.
“I don’t need to be here,” he said. “I’m here to help Seal Rock and the community. That’s where I’m coming from. I will do everything I can to make this work.”