Ed Jones spreads his fingers across the wooden wall joint at the Garibaldi Volunteer Fire Department (GVFD) to show the wall’s thickness.
The fire hall, which opened a year and a half ago, is clearly the recently retired volunteer fire chief’s pride and joy.
“It’s five layers of two-by-six thick,” he said Friday afternoon inside the hall. “The whole building except for these beams… is made from pine-beetle [wood].”
The former hall didn’t have a toilet or running water, he said. Jones could seemingly talk about the new hall all day, but he avoids talking about himself.
Jones is that old-school, strong and silent type of man who would rather do than say, explained the newly minted chief, David McCarthy.
“He is just a lifelong volunteer and he thinks nothing of it. He says, ‘Well, I live here, what am I supposed to do?’”
When Jones crafted his letter announcing his retirement as chief, McCarthy said, the letter was full of thanks to just about everybody Jones had worked with over his last 25 years in the fire department.
“Nothing about himself,” McCarthy added. “It is pretty damn remarkable and I won’t say if that is an old-school process or not, that is just Ed.”
Jones, 75, said he joined the department to help out others in his community.
“Most fire departments are full of A-personalities, but in our fire department, it is pretty much a case of: We have to protect our community and if we didn’t have this department then we would have to rely on Whistler that is 25 minutes away and our insurance rate would be significantly higher, so that is why we are all here,” Jones said.
Over his time in the department, Jones said some things that have changed are the quality of training and equipment.
“It’s grown up,” he said, adding it is much safer to be a firefighter these days.
Even though the focus of the department of 21 volunteers is the Black Tusk–Pine Crest community where the fire hall sits, members also rush to help when Squamish Fire Rescue needs them or if an emergency intersects with the Garibaldi department’s jurisdiction, which stretches from the southern boundary of Whistler south along Highway 99 to the Ministry of Transportation salt sheds.
GVRD volunteers were on the ground fighting the Squamish Terminals fire in April.
“They needed bodies and we can show up and know the protocol,” said McCarthy.
Jones and McCarthy tell the story of an engine fire on a moving train about three years ago in Squamish. The engineer kept going looking for a place to stop where he was close to a fire department and wasn’t surrounded by forest.
“That was handed off. Squamish [Fire Rescue] was following it all the way up, it crossed over [to our jurisdiction] so we went down, and we were able to handle that one right at Chance Creek,” McCarthy said proudly.
Jones and McCarthy were on scene together for that fire, they said.
Jones has enjoyed the camaraderie with fellow firefighters.
“The whole highlight of everything is having the opportunity to work with a real good bunch of guys. They’re pretty special and I am really proud of them,” he says.
McCarthy said now he is officially at the helm after taking over July 1, he wants to continue to ensure the volunteers are well trained and ready for the growing population.
The Garibaldi Volunteer Fire Department is a service of the Squamish-Lillooet Regional District.
