For the first time in its history, Fredonia will soon have a full-time paid fire chief running the Fredonia Fire Department.

Currently the fire department has approximately 100 volunteers and nine paid positions. Rather than adding another separate paid position, the village is in the process of transforming a lieutenant position to fire chief.

In other words, the money for the paid position of fire chief has already been budgeted, said Mayor Athanasia Landis.

“This is something I wanted to do from the beginning,” Landis told the OBSERVER. “Because to me it made perfect sense. One of the village employees should be a fire chief, a paid fire chief. The fire chiefs now are volunteers, and they play a big part, of course. He is elected by the volunteers and the village approves the election.”

In order to help create the paid position, the trustees approved a resolution during Monday’s board of trustees meeting to retain the services of attorney Mark C. Butler, PLLC, of Williamsville.

“He works for fire departments,” said Village Administrator Richard St. George. “He’s going to help us through the process, make sure we pass the correct resolutions.”

The cost for Butler’s services, according to the resolution, are “not to exceed $3,500, unless approved by this board, and travel time at $150 per hour for travel in excess of 50 miles…”

“We have to come up with a job description (with Butler’s guidance) and then the job description has to be approved (by the board),” Landis said.

Although it’s not certain who exactly will fill the fire chief position once it’s established, it is likely the board will promote from within the paid ranks, essentially transforming a lieutenant to chief.

“This will be a first for Fredonia,” Landis said. “We want to try to make things work more efficiently. We will still have the assistant chief, who will come from the volunteer department. I talked with (the fire department). There are some people who don’t agree, but over all they were all for it.”