At last night’s (December 15) meeting, the Morongo Valley Community Services District said that they will not be contracting fire services with the county, and will instead seek to fill fire department vacancies under interim Director of Operations Jim Brakebill. Reporter Jef Harmatz has the full story.
At last night’s regular meeting, after more than an hour of closed session discussions, CSD directors voted narrowly in favor of approving an employment agreement making Deputy Chief Jim Brakebill the interim Director of Operations for the Morongo Valley Fire Department. The current Director of Operations, Gerald Yearsley, who is set to retire at the end of the year, was asked by the board to continue for the next two weeks in an advisory role from his home rather than at the station. At the meeting, Brakebill announced that he would be accepting applications to fill vacancies at the fire department immediately. The board expressed their confidence that new staff would be hired quickly, thus ensuring they would not need to seek assistance from San Bernardino County. However, the board did say that they would continue a parallel track of negotiations with the county as a backup plan.
