6 • THE CALIFORNIA FIRE SERVICE MAGAZINE • MARCH/APRIL 2023 By Deena Lee Women’s Fire Alliance Women’s Fire Alliance offers mentoring and so much more Southern California-based support group hopes to expand statewide Continued on page 9 am currently the Fire Chief of the El Segundo Fire Department where I have proudly served the past 20 years. I am passionate about creating opportunities for women in the fire service, and I am one of the founding members of the Women’s Fire Alliance. The Women’s Fire Alliance (WFA) is a non-profit organization dedicated to the support and empowerment of Southern California women in all aspects of the fire service by promoting an equitable work environment. This organization was born in response to the ARISE Summit (A Reason to Include and Support Everyone) in March of 2018. The Los Angeles County Fire Department, with support from the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors hosted the event with the theme “Women in the Fire Service: Courage to Lead the Way.” This was the first time in Region 1 history that so many women firefighters were gathered under one roof. Following ARISE, a core group of tenacious women firefighters kept pushing forward with the idea of having an organization that would offer support from recruitment to retirement. The executive board co-chairs are Battalion Chief Linda Cessor (Los Angeles Fire Department) and Firefighter Paramedic Erin Regan (Los Angeles County Fire Department), Myself as Vice-Chair (El Segundo Fire Department), Secretary Captain Tamara Chick (Los Angeles Fire Department) and Treasurer Engineer Melissa Hillis (Beverly Hills Fire I Fired Up! Girls Empowerment Camp at El Segundo Fire Department in 2022.
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