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Maryville firefighters are proud of the accreditation certification plaque they brought home from Henderson, Nev.

Maryville joins only two other departments in the state, Nashville and Kingsport, and 122 in the nation that are accredited. After the program was unveiled in 1998 at the Fire and Rescue International meeting in Kansas City, Mo., Maryville looked at the program but did not commit to it until 2005, said Ed Mitchell, who has been Maryville's fire chief for 14 years.

"We thought we would be ready in 2007 and just didn't feel comfortable about asking the assessment team here in 2007, so we focused at bringing everything into total compliance and brought them to Maryville in January," he said.

The team spent six days in Maryville evaluating the department.

"We learned that the team had recommended we become an accredited agency on Jan. 10," Mitchell said.

Last week, Mitchell, Deputy Chief David Hodges, Lt. Mike Caylor and Lt. Randy Thompson traveled to Nevada. They all participated in the final presentation that allowed 15 minutes for a quick overview and for answers to any final questions from commissioners of the Center for Public Safety Excellence.

On Feb. 26, Maryville's team received the plaque that will be displayed in the front entrance to the department in the Maryville Municipal Center.

"The road to accreditation required us to take a look at everything we do and grade ourself," Mitchell said.

The department had to prepare a strategic plan that established written goals and objectives.

"The strategic plan gives us a road map for the future. It makes us continue to look at ourselves," he said.

The department had to go through a self-assessment manual. About 270 performance indicators were measured, documented and evaluated by the department.

"This part of the process took a long time because we had to document most of our performances and then evaluate the process," said Hodges. "If there was a task or indicator that the department didn't perform effectively, it was up to us to recognize that we fell short and determine a plan for improvement."

Caylor was responsible for compiling all the paperwork and submitting the reports for consideration to the Commission on Fire Accreditation International.

Besides the self-evaluation manual and strategic plan, the department also put together a community risk assessment standard of coverage document. This involves "MFD's ability to provide the community with a scope of service that can be expected form their fire, rescue and EMS provider," said Caylor.

The processes included a physical survey of every commercial property, all 792, in Maryville, he said.

The properties were assessed for the risk posed by: life hazard, community impact, life impact, water supply, building usage, building construction, number of stories, square footage and exposures.

The assessment team praised MFD for its door-to-door smoke detector program and on its working relationship with city organization and fire and emergency agencies.

Among the recommendations were expansion of the department's use of Firehouse software to obtain additional data and reports, a budgetary plan to improve the John Sevier Station, which is more than 40 years old, and continued input from the community regarding the department's programs and service.

"I and the rest of the city are excited and proud of MFD's achievements," said Maryville City Manager Greg McClain.

Mitchell said, "It makes us look at ourselves and provide a safer environment for fire and citizens, because failure for accredibility is failure of service. Some departments are afraid to go in-depth and evaluate what they do. They are afraid of what they might find."

"Our work does not end here because we are now an accredited fire department. What happens now is that MFD has a proven method of measuring performance. Our willingness to continue to be a part of the ongoing rigourous recertification process every five years shows we truly care about the safety of our firefighters and our community," Mitchell said.

"In the end, it is a testimony that we, as an organization, want to be held accountable for standards of excellence."