PDX Traffic: Hillsboro Fire Awards Members for Outstanding Work

Hillsboro firefighters gathered Wednesday evening at the Walters Cultural Arts Center to honor their own for service above and beyond the normal call of duty. The Medal of Valor was presented to Hillsboro Fire and Rescue's Chaplain Steve Brodehl for his part in helping to save the life of an unconscious scuba dive instructor while Brodehl and his wife were vacationing in Hawaii. The stricken diver was more than 75-yards offshore at a beach on the island of Hawaii. Chaplain Brodehl was also awarded the Distinguished Service Medal for his role in providing family support, peer critical incident stress management and incident management team support at the funerals of slain Ranier Police Chief Ralph Painter, Eugene Police Officer Chris Kilcullen, and eastern Oregon Corrections Officer Buddy Ray Herron. Brodehl has been instrumental in organizing a response group of chaplains to help deal with tragedies of statewide significance.

Members of the organization selected Firefighter Alia Hoshall as the career Firefighter of the Year for her leadership, organizational skills and selfless devotion to the Toy and Joy program which collects toys and distributes them to area needy children at Christmas. Volunteers selected Marc Ahrendt as the Volunteer Firefighter of the Year for his enthusiastic leadership, devotion to duty and wide ranging skills.

The Chief's Award went to Battalion Chief Yvain McDaniel for his role in moving the department's training from certification-based standards to performance-based standards, implementing an electronic document management program to archive training records, rewriting the core curriculum for fire and emergency medical training at the department, instituted on-line training and helping to design a future video conferencing system to allow crews to obtain some of their necessary training without leaving the fire station and for supervising the delivery of two very successful large scale, multi-jurisdictional training and live-action scenario drills during the past year.

Four members of the department received a Distinguished Unit Commendation for their role in creating and delivering the training for and the execution of those drills. They were Battalion Chief Yvain McDaniel, Battalion Chief Jason Blount, Engineer Abe Madrigal and Firefighter Jeff Gurske. The drills were a Mass Casualty Incident which was a simulated serious accident involving a school bus, and a simulated Active Shooter Scenario at a public school. The latter multi-day training and drill involved training staff and police officers from Hillsboro Police Department. The effort was videotaped and has been receiving attention from other police and fire agencies around the region.

Fire Inspector Martin Stapleton received the Chief's Coin of Excellence for his outreach to students in the Hillsboro School District. Martin has been teaching elements of the fire science courses at Liberty High School. And, recently, he created an interactive fire investigation demonstration at south Meadows Middle School to show students how much science was involved in the fire service.

Fire Inspector Joseph Ligatich was recognized with a Chief's Coin of Excellence for his role in creating an emergency scene post-incident board up program. The program utilizes a list of contractors who can respond to incidents, such as a structure fire, to secure the property and prevent additional loss to the owner's property.

Administrative Chief Scott Malone, Lieutenant Mark Gregg, and Firefighters Brent Wellington, Matt Dobbin, Tommy Bonin and Sam Scott were recognized with a Chief's Coin of Excellence for their overseas work in conjunction with Medical Teams International in helping to set up an emergency medical system in Cambodia. The team members have made two trips off-duty and at their own expense to teach field emergency medicine to students to help deal with the 15-percent annual rise in injuries from serious traffic accidents. The country has no first responder system as the United States does to respond to and rescue injured motorists.

The firefighters also recognized volunteer Battalion Chief Steve Huntington for his total of 38 years of service to Hillsboro Fire and Rescue. Huntington retired effective March 6th.

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Caption / Image attachments:
Chaplain Steve Brodehl 9325.jpg --- Hillsboro Fire Chief Greg Nelson (l) congratulates Chaplain Steve Brodehl on receiving two awards at the Fire Department's annual awards ceremony Wednesday night.

Marc Ahrendt 9331.jpg -- Firefighter Marc Ahrendt receives the Volunteer Firefighter of the Year award as selected by his peers at Hillsboro Fire & Rescue.

Alia Hoshall 9333.jpg --- Career Firefighter Alia Hoshall receives the Firefighter of the Year award during an awards ceremony Wednesday night at the Hillsboro Walters Cultural Arts Center.

BC Yvain McDaniel 9329.jpg --- Battalion Chief Yvain McDaniel (r) receives the Chief's Award from Fire Chief Greg Nelson for McDaniel's work in revamping the department's training program.

Cambodia Crew 9319.jpg --- Firefighters from Hillsboro Fire Department who went to Cambodia off-duty and at their own expense to train first responders in emergency medicine are (l to r) Administrative Chief Scott Malone, Firefighters Brent Wellington, Lieutenant Mark Gregg, Firefighter Tommy Bonin, Firefighter Sam Scott. Fire Chief Greg Nelson (r) presented them with the Chief's Coin of Excellence. Not shown, Firefighter Matt Dobbin.

Ret BC Steve Huntington 9311.jpg --- Hillsboro Fire Chief Greg Nelson (l) presents a badge memento to retiring volunteer Battalion Chief Steve Huntington who has served Hillsboro for 38 years.

Stapleton Ligatich 9316.jpg --- Hillsboro Fire Marshal (l) and Fire Chief Greg Nelson (r) present the Chief's Coin of Excellence to Inspectors Martin Stapleton and Joseph Ligatich at the Department's annual awards ceremony Wednesday night at the Walters Cultural Arts Center.

Training Unit Com 9321.jpg - Hillsboro Deputy Chief Mark Prince (l) and Fire Chief Greg Nelson (r) present the Distinguish Unit Commendation to Battalion Chief Yvain McDaniel and Engineer Abe Madrigal for their work, along with Hillsboro Police officers, on a joint active shooter training and simulation at a local school. Not shown are Battaion Chief Jason Blount and Firefighter Jeff Gurske.

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