Until his retirement, Chief Gary was the Fire Chief of the Livermore–Pleasanton Fire Department. Now in his 47th year in the Fire Service, Chief Gary began as a volunteer and worked his way up through the ranks, including his service as a Paramedic for five years.
Chief Gary started his career with the City of Poway in San Diego County, attaining the rank of Battalion Chief / Fire Marshal. He subsequently served as the Administrative Battalion Chief for the Carlsbad Fire Department in San Diego County. He was appointed Fire Chief for the City of Livermore, California, in January 1994, and two years later, he successfully facilitated the peer-to-peer merger of the Livermore and Pleasanton Fire Departments into one seamless 10-company department, from which he retired as Chief. This successful consolidation was awarded the esteemed Helen Putnam Award for Excellence by the California League of Cities in 1999.
Chief Gary has both a bachelor’s and master’s degree in Public Administration from San Diego State University. He holds an associate degree in fire science from Miramar Community College in San Diego and a certificate in fire protection administration from San Diego State, and he has attended hundreds of hours of seminar course work in fire protection.
Chief Gary has served in elected professional positions, including: President of the California League of Cities, Fire Chiefs Department and Chairperson of the San Diego County Paramedic Agencies. He has been involved in progressive responsibility for creating or implementing fire protection policy on the local, state, and national levels. He has served as a board member representing cities on the California Office of Emergency Services-FIRESCOPE Board and served two terms as the fire chief representative on the California League of Cities Board of Directors. Chief Gary served on the Livermore School District Board and served as an elected official on the City of Livermore City Council.
“Thank you so much for all you have done. And it’s so comprehensive, I know it’s going to take a while for us to digest it all, but I think you’ve come up with some really good recommendations.”
Pro Tempore City of Vista, CA
“I am very much appreciative of Citygate’s comprehensive view of all the issues. And you have been very candid and very forthright in the problem areas that you have identified and we appreciate that. Quite often sometimes people choose to gloss over those issues and therefore we never can get a real good handle on the problem to resolve it. And I very much appreciate your insight and your intuitive natures that you have all experienced in your government services and trying to identify where our problem areas are so we can identify for the public. I very much appreciate the idea and the comments that you made that we are talking about the citizens who come to the planning Department as customers. And so you’ve done a great service for us and we are certainly appreciative of all your efforts.”
Commissioner Jackson County
“I really, really enjoyed reading your Word product. I appreciate the fact that it was direct, it was constructive, and . . . it wasn’t finger-pointing, it was just . . . the facts. And I think that the money was well spent.”
Salt Lake City Council Meeting
“I think Citygate has done a great job. It seems like you’ve been most thorough and even-handed in your evaluations and you’ve given us certainly a lot of suggestions and guidelines to work with.”
City of Vista, CA
“I am really, really impressed. I am impressed at the exhaustiveness of your study, impressed at the honesty and candor with which you expressed your findings; I am very impressed at the constructive tone of it, and that you came in under budget as well. So, thank you very much. I think that this document is going to be a cornerstone for us really moving forward for the next five, ten, twenty [years], half a century.”
Salt Lake City Council Meeting
“We work with consultants, obviously, all the time, but the work that Citygate did on this report is some of the best I’ve seen in my tenure here.”
Retired Chief Administrative Officer San Diego County
