Montgomery County fire marshal

Montgomery County Fire Marshal Jimmy Williams became enthralled with fire safety at a young age, and his passion for his job continues to grow. After graduating from the Texas A&M University Fire Academy in 1984, Williams worked for a fire department near Willis. He was recruited to the fire marshal's office in 1994 and appointed as fire marshal in 2004.

"I am still active in two fire departments," he said. "I work part time and volunteer as a firefighter in New Waverly and North Montgomery County. It keeps it fresh for me and I get to stay on the front line and work on a truck with other young firefighters. The most important thing an old fire fighter can teach a young firefighter is how to become an old firefighter. It's all about safety."

The county fire marshal's office enforces codes in unincorporated areas of the county. However, Williams' officers still respond and assist municipal departments in fire investigations and emergencies. Through public outreach and maintaining partnerships with city departments, Williams works hard to keep his jurisdiction fire safe.

As fire marshal, what is your role in the community?

Our primary role is to ensure public safety in commercial and public buildings, but we are a split department. Part of our department focuses on fire investigation and the other part on code enforcement in buildings.

Looking at building safety, we examine needed safety systems. We respond to any complaints about safety issues in buildings and look at all new construction. That's very important because when you look at the growth happening in The Woodlands and South Montgomery County, we are going to be building high-rise buildings almost every month for the next few years, and the fire marshal's office is going to be playing a big role in making those buildings safe. On the investigation side, we investigate the cause of all structure fires and land fires if they are suspicious and look into criminal activity as well. If it's a criminal investigation, we will pursue the person [who] started the fire up to the trial.

All of our officers are peace officers and can make arrests if needed. We have made everything from simple misdemeanor arrests to capital murder arrests.

Are there any misconceptions the public may have about your office?

There are a couple of misconceptions. A lot of people don't even know what our office does, and most do not realize we are involved in both criminal investigations and code enforcement. Those are two very different animals. From the code enforcement side, the biggest misconception people have is they look at us as the bad guys when it comes to safety. I call us the "fun police" because basically people see it as if there is something you want to do that is fun, the fire marshal's office won't let you do it. So, we are the bad guys.

Really, the reason we are there is because somebody has gotten hurt or killed before when a safety violation occurred. For instance, people don't understand why doors in theaters and churches swing out. It's because in 1907 a fire in a Chicago theater had 107 bodies piled against doors that swung in. So, codes changed to reflect that. One of the sayings is the codes are written in blood. When a code says you should do this, it's because someone has died or been seriously injured in that way. We don't want to shut anyone down; we just want the place to be safe. The other misconception is most people don't realize that the fire marshal's office are police officers and do criminal investigations.

What is something the department is working on right now?

One goal we are working on in our region is pushing a regional code to make it the same across the Greater Houston Area through Galveston. One thing we have heard from developers and builders is they do not mind the codes, but they just want them to be consistent throughout an area.

If you are building in Montgomery County, you're probably building in Harris County or Fort Bend County, and you do not want to have a different set of standards in each one. It just depends on what version of the fire code a municipality or county has adopted.

How does your department work with city fire departments?

In smaller cities where there is no municipal fire marshal, and the police department does not have an arson investigator, we go in and work for them. In fire response, we create a cause and origin report for the fire, and if we determine it is a crime, we work for them to solve it. And we do that quite regularly. That is the same way we work with school districts. We help out in a lot of different places, especially if it is difficult to find a fire expert.

What advice do you have for residents as spring approaches and temperatures rise?

The third component of our office is prevention and outreach. We post regularly on our Facebook page. What we saw in the 2011 wildfires was houses were being burnt down not because a big wall of fire came through a neighborhood, but embers would drop into a neighborhood and start a small fire by the house. Something as small as pine needles by the house or a small bush fire can spread fire into the eve and through the window. During the Magnolia fires, it was spreading house to house by wooden fences. Now we are posting everyday tips for fire-safe landscaping.

Stay away from flammable vegetation until you are farther away from your house, and try to use a few feet of rock or gravel before planting vegetation, and prevent pine straw from accumulating around your house.