Christian Tubbs is a respected fire service executive with more than 47 years of experience leading emergency service organizations at the local, regional, state, and national levels. He served as Fire Chief of the Southern Marin Fire Protection District from 2014 to 2026, where he led organizational transformation initiatives, regional collaborations, wildfire risk reduction programs, strategic planning efforts, and major governance and service delivery improvements. Prior to Southern Marin, he served as Fire Chief for the City of Mercer Island, Washington, following a 36-year career with the department.
Chief Tubbs is a Past President of the California Fire Chiefs Association and has represented the fire service on numerous state and national committees, including the FIRESCOPE Board of Directors, California Homeland Security Advisory Committee, IAFC Technology Council, and NFPA 950 and 951 committees. He also served for 19 years with Washington Task Force 1 (FEMA Urban Search and Rescue), deploying to major incidents including the Oklahoma City bombing and Hurricane Katrina.
He holds a Master of Arts from the Naval Postgraduate School, a Master of Science from Grand Canyon University, executive certificates from Harvard Kennedy School, Cornell, Wharton, and MIT Sloan School of Management, and is currently pursuing a Ph.D. in Public Administration. He is an Executive Fire Officer (EFO), Chief Fire Officer (CFO), California Certified Fire Chief (CFC), and Member of the Institution of Fire Engineers (MIFireE).
“I wanted to offer my compliments to Citygate, to Mr. Gary for this very comprehensive report.”
San Luis Obispo Council Member
“I was absolutely thrilled with the report because it was very comprehensive, very detailed. I call it the ‘time-in-motion study’ almost and some of the aspects [are] ‘how does your paper flow? How can you make your processes better? . . . As a government agency, how can we provide better service to the constituents?’ And to us we think that this study identifies those things down to all of the small paper processes and flows.”
Retired City Manager City of Vista, CA
“Thank you so much for this training. This was the best PIO training I’ve ever received.”
S-403 Information Officer class participant
“I think this is one of the most comprehensive reports and I think probably one of the best presented reports I’ve seen in my years in government service. I want to start off by commending you for that and acknowledge that the work that you were able to do with cooperation from all of the different firefighting agencies in this region was second-to-none.”
Supervisor First District San Diego County
“[Stu Gary’s] knowledge, expertise, and demeanor were invaluable in our efforts to ferret out a fair agreement with the City. I could go on and on about Stu, but you already know all of the superlatives.”
AAE, General Manager Monterey Regional Airport
“Thank you very much for a comprehensive report. Thank you.”
Palm Springs
