Fire Chief

Bruce Evans (MPA, NRP, CFOD, SPO) is the Fire Chief at the Upper Pine River Fire Protection District. Chief Evans arrived in La Plata County after serving as the EMS Chief and as an Assistant Chief at the North Las Vegas Fire Department in Southern Nevada. Chief Evans had served at the Henderson (NV) Fire Department for 18 years, seven as a fire captain and six as an EMS captain. Mr. Evans is an NFPA Fire Instructor III and served as a college faculty member at the College of Southern Nevada's Fire Technology program teaching various fire and EMS topics for 21 years.

Bruce has over 36 years experience in a variety of emergency services settings and is the 2010 recipient of the International Association of Fire Chiefs James O Page award for Leadership in EMS and the National Association of EMT's Presential Leadership Award in 2014. Bruce is an adjunct faculty of the National Fire Academy in the EMS, Incident Management, and Terrorism Training programs serving as a technical writer for several of the courses at the National Fire Academy. He is currently the President for the National Association of EMT's. Chief Evans has an appointment to the National Academies of Medicine and sits on the prepardness committee. He holds a Masters degree in Public Administration, Bachelors degree in Education, and Associates in Fire Management.

Bruce is a Colorado and Nationally Registered paremedic and has a Supervising EMS Officer credential.  Bruce co-authored several textbooks including, Crew Resource Management with Jones and Bartlett, Management of EMS and EMS Quality Improvement and Research with Pearson Publishing, IFSTA's Structural Series on High-Rise Firefighting and has contributed to IFSTA's Fire and Life Safety Educator and Company Officer's Textbook. He is one of the authors of the National Association of EMT's Safety Course and the Principles of Ethics and Personal Leadership course. Chief Evans, his wife Debora and son Oliver have lived in Durango since 2008.