Memorial service today for retired Alameda County Fire Chief Bill McCammon

A memorial service will be held at 11 a.m. Thursday at the Alameda County Fairgrounds for Bill McCammon, retired Alameda County Fire Chief who died in his sleep Oct. 13. He was 61.

Mr. McCammon was currently serving as the executive director of the East Bay Regional Communications System Authority, which built and operates an inter-operable communications system for 43 public agencies within Alameda and Contra Costa counties. He was also the current president of the Alameda County Fair Board of Directors and Treasurer of the National Fire Protection Association’s Board of Directors.

As the first fire chief of Alameda County Fire, the department doubled in size under his leadership with the addition of contracts for service with the cities of Dublin and San Leandro and the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.

He implemented the hazardous materials response team, paramedic program and rescue company and a water rescue program. He led the effort to form the Alameda County Regional Emergency Communications Center, which handles fire and ambulance dispatch throughout most of Alameda County.

Mr. McCammon also:

• Served as Immediate past President of the California Fire Chiefs Association served two years as President Elect and two years as President. During these terms Chief McCammon lead the California fire service through some difficult times including the selection of a new Fire and Building Code and the Southern California Fire Siege of 2003. As President, Chief McCammon testified before State Assembly Committees and the United States Congress on issues related to homeland security and the fire service.

• Appointed by Governor Gray Davis to the Emergency Response Training Advisory Committee, which oversaw policy development related to training issues facing first responders responding to weapons of mass destruction and terrorism.

• Appointed by the Governor’s Director of Homeland Security to serve on an Advisory Committee to develop policy for the distribution of Federal Terrorism funding.

• Selected by the Governor’s Director of the Office of Emergency Services (OES) to serve as a Board Member on FIRESCOPE, the Board advising OES on mutual aid and incident management issues.

• Appointed by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger to a Blue Ribbon Fire Commission to study and make recommendations regarding the Fire Siege in Southern California in 2003.

• Served as Vice Chair of the Metropolitan Fire Chiefs Association. The Association represents the largest fire departments in the United States, Canada and the world.

Mr. McCammon was a Harvard University Fellow of the Executive Development Program for senior governmental officials. He also served five years as the president of RotaCare of the Bay Area, a non-profit organization which provides free medical care to the uninsured through nine clinics from San Rafael to Monterey, and he has served as the site administrator for the San Leandro RotaCare Clinic since 1995.

He was a member of the San Leandro Rotary Club and served on the Las Positas College Foundation Board of Directors.

He is survived by his wife Rose Padilla-Johnson and three children, Monica, Daniel and Jessica.

In lieu of flowers, donations in honor of Mr. McCammon may be sent to the Davis Street Family Resource Center at 3081 Teagarden, San Leandro, CA 94577. Donations may also be made online via www.davisstreet.org/ and will be used to support its primary care medical clinic.

Thursday’s memorial service will be held in Building A, the Young California Building, at the Fairgrounds. Although the service will begin at 11 a.m., guests are encouraged to arrive no later than 10:30 a.m.