Marine Corps Logistics Base Albany Fire & Emergency Services has received accredited agency status with the Commission on Fire Accreditation International for meeting the criteria established through the CFAI’s voluntary self-assessment and accreditation program.

The accredited status term is good for five years with annual compliance reports required throughout the term to maintain accredited status. It was awarded March 5, 2020, in Orlando, Fla. 

MCLB Albany Fire & Emergency Services is one of more than 250 agencies to achieve internationally accredited agency status with the CFAI and the Center for Public Safety Excellence, Inc. MCLB Albany Fire & Emergency Services joins Atlanta, Savannah and Columbus city fire departments along with Moody Air Force Base and Naval Submarine Base Kings Bay as among the agencies in Georgia accredited through CFAI and CPSE.

CFAI is dedicated to assisting the fire and emergency service agencies throughout the world in achieving excellence through self-assessment and accreditation in order to provide continuous quality improvement and the enhancement of service delivery to their communities. The CFAI process provides an agency with an improvement model to assess their service delivery and performance internally before working with a team of peers from other agencies to evaluate their completed self-assessment.

MCLB Albany Fire Chief Phil Partin stated the agency’s achievement of accredited agency status “demonstrates the commitment of the agency to provide the highest quality of service to our community.” 

“We have also been able to use the Commission on Fire Accreditation International’s process as a proactive mechanism to plan for the future of this agency and locate areas where we can improve on the quality of the services we provided,” Partin added. “As an accredited agency at MCLB Albany Fire & Emergency Services we will continue to build and improve relationships within our community.”

Assistant Fire Chief Steven Land said the firefighting profession has evolved over the years from being an organization that “puts the wet stuff on the hot stuff” to a data driven, all-hazards response organization. 

In essence, the profession has become a business in need of a business model. The CFAI accreditation process has become that business model for the firefighting profession. 

“Being an accredited agency essentially means we are committed to continuous improvement and ensuring we are providing the best service possible to the community we serve,” Land stated. “Following the CFAI model guides us with examining past, current and future service levels and measures our department’s performance.”

“Furthermore, the model is based on risk analysis and self-assessment that promotes the establishment of community-adopted performance targets,” Land added. “When evaluating the numerous elements of our department we ask ourselves the following questions: What are we doing? Why are we doing it? How well are we doing it? How can we make it better? Doing so aids us with identifying strengths and weaknesses, resulting in setting goals and objectives in an effort to build success in our pursuit of excellence.” 

The initial accreditation process takes approximately four years in total to accomplish, during which time agencies are required to develop the follow core documents. Once assessments have been completed and the requirements of CFAI have been met, a peer team comprised of members from departments throughout the world verifies and validates the agency’s operations to ensure the agency is community-focused, data-driven, outcome-focused, strategic-minded, well organized, properly equipped and properly staffed and trained.

The team hands down a recommendation on whether to award accreditation. Their report of findings and recommendations is sent to the CFAI commission for an official vote that is conducted at one of two annual hearings.