Councilman: New Fire Chief "Unique and Driven Leader"

The City of Smyrna's new fire chief received praise from an elected official during Monday evening's Smyrna City Council meeting after formally being voted in to the position.

Paige Day, most recently the assistant fire chief in Missouri City, TX, was named the sole finalist for the position after an evaluation and interview process which saw 50 candidates narrowed down to 14 and then five finalists.

The finalists, who included interim fire chief Roy Acree, were subjected to tests and interviews during a weekend session. All performed admirably, but Councilman Ron Fennel said that Day won out because of her dedication and called her a "unique and driven leader."

Day came to firefighting late in life, but in a 10 year period has earned two associate degrees, a bachelor's degree, a master's degree, and will soon earn a doctorate in organizational leadership. She went from being a rookie EMT in 1998 to captain in 2005 and assistant chief in 2011.

On the home front, Day has two sons in the military, a daughter who will soon attend Campbell High School, and a husband who is suffering from traumatic brain injury as the result of a motorcycle accident. Day has written a book about her experiences with her husband's injury called "Fading Scars." 

"And still, through all of this, she has been a leader and has continued to be driven, focused and motivated to be a great paramedic and firefighter, plus earned her degrees, wrote a book, managed a family and wrote a blog," Fennel said.

"I think you will all see that Smyrna has a great new leader in our community."