Bosque Farms has a new fire chief

BOSQUE FARMS — There was a changing of the chiefs in the village of Bosque Farms as fire chief Aaron Brogdon stepped down from his position, and his assistant chief, Jason Schneider, was unanimously approved and appointed as the new chief.

Brogdon, who was appointed as chief in February 2022, gave his final report to the council at the Feb. 20 meeting.

“Leading this extraordinary group has been an honor. It would not be possible without them and we can’t move forward without them,” Brogdon said.

He asked the council to support the department membership in its backing of Schneider as the next chief.

“I have absolute confidence in his leadership,” he said.

In his letter of resignation. Brogdon said he needed to realign his focus on two important areas — his family and professional responsibilities.

“This is a balance I know you all understand well,” the chief wrote in his Jan. 29 letter to the mayor and council. “While stepping back is not an easy decision, it’s the right one for me at this time.

“That said, I cannot overstate how much I’ve cherished my time as chief. Leading this extraordinary group of individuals has been one of the greatest privileges of my life. I hope I was able to meet their expectations and serve as the leader they needed. It would not have been possible without them.”

Brogdon will step into the role of assistant chief, “and continue to support both him and the department in any way I can,” and has no plans to leave the department.

During the council meeting, Brogdon spoke to the council about what he called the “growing EMS crisis,” saying there is an urgent need for emergency medical response in the village.

“Our department is not back up. It is the first response,” he said of the village volunteer firefighters. “We answer calls day and night ... in the past year, we’ve had 300-plus calls and we are on track for 350 to 360 in the next year.”

Brogdon said many of those calls went unanswered by Bosque Farms and “thankfully we have (American Medical Response) and the county has stepped in, but often they are sitting at Status Zero.

“That is why our volunteer fire department is so important. When EMS is not available and outside resources are thin, we respond. We do all this without expecting anything in return except serving our neighbors.”

Status Zero occurs when transport ambulances with AMR are already dispatched to calls or are in Albuquerque waiting to hand off a patient to hospital staff. Municipal and county emergency departments aren’t authorized to transport a patient and are often stuck making the difficult decision to either wait for AMR or make the drive north.

The former chief issued a “call to action,” asking whether the village wanted to rely on already overburdened outside resources or, when the next emergency happens, “do you want someone to be there to answer the call?”