Achieving dream required 20 years

Photo by: Special to The Vindicator/Mark Stahl

Photo

Youngstown Fire Department Chief Fire Inspector Marcia Harris.

By John W. Goodwin Jr.

Marcia Harris became a firefighter in 1991 and a fire inspector three years later.

YOUNGSTOWN — Marcia Harris, the city’s chief fire inspector, is the highest-ranking woman in the fire department’s history, but the ascent to that office started with a simple dream of a decent job and doing something good in the community.

It was a little more than 20 years ago that Harris first walked into the main fire station downtown as a receptionist. The then-32-year-old mother of two young girls had received a degree from the School of Allied Sciences at Youngstown State University and had been working as a secretary at a local baking company and a hospital part time.

“I can’t really say I was excited about the fire department when I got hired, but once I got going, I just couldn’t sit still. I have always wanted to raise the bar and go as high as I can,” she said.

Harris took the exam and appropriate training, becoming a firefighter in 1991. She was promoted to a fire inspector in 1994, and after two decades in the department, she was promoted to chief fire inspector in early October.

Harris took a competitive exam for the position after the retirement of the former chief fire inspector, Hubert Clardy, in January.

Harris said she was enthusiastic to assume the new position and began cleaning the office immediately, breaking a vacuum bag and causing herself to have an asthma attack hours into the new position. Since recovering from the dust-induced asthma attack, however, she has settled into the new position.

Harris looks around her new office and smiles, noting that the office is nothing new to her. The name and title associated with the office are different, but it is the same space she occupied as a secretary when she came into the department 20 years ago.

After more than 20 years in the department, Harris said she has some memories that are wonderful and others that are not so good but will live with her for the rest of her life.

Once of those not-so-pleasant yet-unforgettable memories is a South Side house fire in 1993 that killed five children and two adults. Harris remembers working feverishly to maintain the breathing of one of the victims and still cannot talk about the moment she realized the person, a grandparent to the children in the fire, had died.

“People always want to ask what was it like, but they don’t really want to know. It’s something I still can’t talk about. It’s just overwhelming,” she said.

Those memories are part of the reason Harris takes her position with fire prevention and inspection seriously. She wants to see the department’s work evident in the community.

“I want to the job of fire prevention and inspection to progress. I really want to make a difference here,” she said.

Capt. Ray Sanchez has known Harris since she joined the department. He said he has watched her perform a litany of task in the department and has no doubts about her success as chief fire inspector.

“I think she will do an outstanding job. Everything she has done, she has done a good job doing, and she pursues her job with intensity. I just can’t see her doing a bad job,” he said.

Harris said it is important for the public to understand that fire prevention and inspection is responsible for approving safety standards in all city businesses. She said people don’t pay attention to what the department does, but the hard work is evident when one compares the high volume of businesses to the relatively low dollar amount of loss to fire in those businesses.

Harris does not sit still in her spare time. She works with federal organizations on fire- related topics, helps departments with diversity issues and attends regular training in other parts of the country.

jgoodwin@vindy.com