Top step of the ladder: Roger St. Martin takes on a new job as Fall River's fire chief

FALL RIVER — To say Fire Chief Roger St. Martin’s first day of taking the helm at the Fall River Fire Department was trial by fire is an understatement.

“It was definitely a challenging day,” said St. Martin on Thursday, two days after the City Council unanimously approved his appointment and the morning after a public swearing-in ceremony on the sixth-floor of Government Center in front of family and colleagues.

On Jan. 29, St. Martin, 55, woke up like everyone else to a blizzard that hit the region with a vengeance.

Just the day before, veteran Fall River Fire Chief John Lynch, a longtime fellow firefighter and good friend, retired from his more than three decades with the city fire department and handed over the reins to St. Martin.

“I was in my truck plowing my road and my driveway, listening to the radio and listening to the ambulances getting stuck and the fire department having trouble getting up streets with fire apparatus. So, I was just monitoring the radio at that point,” said St. Martin.

Then he got a call from the head of EMS around 4 p.m. that afternoon with information that the department received multiple calls regarding a fire on Irving Street.

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“He said ‘Chief, I think you’ve got a big fire, I think you better come in,'” said St. Martin.

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The fire chief hopped in his pick-up truck and headed toward Irving Street as more pieces of fire apparatus were descending on the scene.

But there were difficulties at play for the fire department as apparatus attempted to reach the fire at 140 Irving St. An abandoned plow truck blocked one way into the fire scene and an illegally parked vehicle at the other end, the owner not heeding the parking ban, hampered the department’s response.

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Extreme icy conditions and covered fire hydrants didn’t help the city firefighters to battle the four-alarm fire at the multi-family home.

The structure was destroyed and parts of it collapsed to the ground, but all the tenants got out safely and the city firefighters managed to save nearby apartment buildings in what could have been the perfect storm of the destruction of the neighborhood.

Seven adults and four children were displaced and two firefighters suffered non-life threatening injuries.

“It could have been a lot worse. We have a good group of personnel, men and women, and they performed extraordinary efforts, I have to say that,” said St. Martin.

Up through the ranks

This July will mark St. Martin’s 35th anniversary as a Fall River firefighter, but it wasn’t always his goal as a young man.

Raised in the South End, St. Martin attended Fall River schools, graduating from Diman Regional Vocational Technical High School after studying carpentry. Right after high school he joined the Navy Seabees, the Naval construction battalion.

Later, on with the GI bill, he studied criminal justice at Bristol Community College, with an eye towards a possible career in law enforcement.

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Someone from Bristol CC suggested that St. Martin take the fire service civil exam offered that year. He took the exam, did well and was offered a job in the Fall River Fire Department.

“It just seemed like a good fit. It was a great group of guys and I remember it feeling like a family and surrounded by great people, that in my estimation, were doing extraordinary things,” said St. Martin.

It’s been a good career, added St. Martin.

From firefighter, apparatus driver, public safety dispatcher as he moved through the ranks to captain when he was soon deployed to Iraq for a year for the military. “I’ve handled just about every position on the fire department,” said St. Martin.

He’s been a district chief in charge of the Globe, Flint and Candeias fire stations.

In 2017, St. Martin was promoted to deputy chief where he was assigned to operations for a short time then as the city’s fire marshal.

“There really aren’t many roles I haven’t held at the Fall River Fire Department,” said St. Martin.

St. Martin's goals as fire chief

For the last ten years, St. Martin has worked with the city grant writers to help gain funding for the fire department, gaining essential funding for a myriad of needs including firefighter safety.

“We were actually able to secure in the last ten years almost $20 million in grants for the city of Fall River, whether it was apparatus, turnout gear or training and manpower through SAFER grants,” said St. Martin.

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He said he’ll remain focused on that aspect of the job.

Another focus, said St. Martin, is his work with the administration regarding the condition of the department’s fire stations.

“Fall River is a poor city and we know that our buildings are old and they need a little bit of work and I’d like to focus on that, and I think it would be a big motivator for the firefighters,” said St. Martin.

And working in fire prevention for the last five years, St. Martin said “I’d like to push that a little more.”

“To try to change the behaviors and attitudes with regard to fires in the city of Fall River. We have a public education program, but of course in the last two years we couldn’t do anything in person,” said St. Martin.

The program has been successful with reaching children in schools to educate them so they have good fire safety behaviors.

“We need to reach the adults. Recently we've had a lot of smoking related fires and improper use of electrical cords and overloading electrical systems in buildings,” said St. Martin. “Those are big things and those are adult things. So, I think education will be another initiative.”

Jo C. Goode may be reached at jgoode@heraldnews.com. Support local journalism and subscribe to The Herald News today!

This article originally appeared on The Herald News: Fall River swears in Roger St. Martin as fire chief