It’s been nearly a year since residents of the rural community voted to dissolve the fire district and expected to be annexed by Jackson County Fire District 5

By Buffy Pollock, Rogue Valley Times

After six decades of helping to provide fire protection for his rural community on the flanks of Mount Ashland, lifelong Colestin resident Steve Avgeris has yet to hang up his hose.

Nearing a full year since residents of the rural community voted to dissolve the Colestin Rural Fire Protection District — with plans to be annexed by Jackson County Fire District No. 5 just months later — the former chief of the now-defunct district maintains his fire apparatus and still responds to calls for help.

When residents of the Colestin community voted by a margin of 95% to 5% to dissolve the district on Jan. 1, 2024, Avgeris had served for the duration of the 42 years that the district had been in existence.

Struggles that began for District 5 in February — less than two months after the Colestin district officially dissolved — brought the Talent-based district’s stability into question. The firefighter’s union declared it had no confidence in district leadership, and a slew of financial struggles came to light. 

The district’s three fire stations provide fire protection to 120 square miles of southern Jackson County, including the cities of Phoenix and Talent and unincorporated areas surrounding Ashland, down to the California border.

Between February and October, District 5 Chief Charles Hanley, who helped navigate the plans for dissolution and subsequent annexation in Colestin, was placed on leave and his employment was later terminated; more than half the district board resigned and had to be replaced; and one of the district’s fire stations — No. 4 on Neil Creek Road near Emigrant Lake in Ashland — had to be browned out due to an ongoing staffing shortage.

Avgeris, who has been putting out fires for most of his life, said he always planned to stick around until things were settled with District 5.

He grew up on the mountain, worked as a logger for 38 years and raised his family there. His family had been in Colestin for generations and even ran a hotel there in the early 1900s.

When he helped to form the Colestin fire district in 1982, Avgeris had been helping fight fires for almost two decades.

“I guess I started in fire service when I was 12 years old. That’s when I fought my first fire,” he said. “It was in 1963. At the time, the Forest Service had a little station during summers with two firefighters. They staffed it with one fire truck. We used to have a lot of train fires back in those days.

“When the train would go by, I’d run down to the tracks. … We’d get fires that started in the bed of the railroad, in the railroad ties,” Avgeris recalled. “I had a little Honda bike and I’d jump on that and run down to tell the Forest Service guys. … They took me under their wing at 12 years old; they’d let me ride with them in the fire truck, and I thought that was really cool.”

Avgeris remembers a former fire captain named Frank Chadwick.

“He started me in the fire service. The Forest Service had a mobile home they lived in during the summer. I’d go down there at night. He said, ‘You look really interested in all this,’ so he started my training.

“I’ve been fighting fires 85% of my life,” Avgeris said.

When disaster struck in 1981 — the Colestin Fire on Aug. 10 of that year would consume more than 700 acres — Avgeris helped create the rural district he would lead for four decades. 

“We didn’t really have anything here for fire protection before then. During the Colestin Fire, things went horribly wrong with all the agencies that responded up here,” he said. “They sat down here in the driveway on the hood of a pickup and argued over whose fire it was. … Meanwhile, the fire’s raging up the mountain.

“I was so angry. My thing was, ‘How about let’s put out the fire — get it contained — then we can argue,'” Avgeris remembers thinking.

“What it’s all about is always the money. ‘Who’s gonna pay the bills?’ But I don’t care about who’s gonna pay the bills. Let’s stop the fire and then decide who’s gonna pay for it.”

Weeks later, Avgeris began the process to form the Colestin district, which over the years responded to all calls on the Interstate 5 area and, with assistance from the nearby Hilt Volunteer Fire Company that Avgeris helped to start in 1994, and other neighboring agencies, provided fire protection for a 17-square-mile area between the Mt. Ashland Ski Road and the California border.

The vote to dissolve the district, he said, was a necessity due to an aging volunteer core and a dwindling number of young families moving onto the mountain.

“The gist of it is that we did a fantastic job for 42 years, from 1982 to January 1, 2024, but we just ran out of people. It got to the point where I can’t keep doing this forever … and nobody else is coming to do it,” he said.

“I just turned 73, and I shouldn’t be doing this right now, but I’ve been the only game in town for a while now. I still come to put out the fires, and I keep myself in good shape, physically, but 73 is 73.”

Aaron Bustard, interim fire chief for Fire District 5, said the Colestin community is lucky to have Avgeris keeping a watchful eye. Bustard said his district is working on the logistics of annexing the rural area, as planned, but that a tumultuous year had certainly cause some delays.

A notice on the Colestin district website offers an update for residents.

Bustard said his district, Avgeris and Fire District 3 — which recently finalized an intergovernmental agreement to provide administrative help for District 5 — are navigating toward a likely annexation in early 2025.

Bustard said he’s grateful for Avgeris’ supportive attitude of District 5 and his willingness to help however he can.

“With everything going on with us, we just had a conversation with Steve and he said he understood where we were at … he said that they’re basically in an OK place right now,” Bustard said Friday. “We don’t have a formal agreement, but we’re still responding down there. There’s a mutual aid agreement with Cal-Fire, and we’re working with Steve with the understanding that we’re working toward eventual annexation.

“They’ve been great neighbors to us, so we just wanna continue to help them the best we can moving forward. We’re not in a great position right now but we’re figuring things out and still want to be a help to our neighbors,” Bustard added. “We’re trying to honor the trust they’ve put in us.”

Avgeris shrugs off any accolades and says he’s just doing what he’s always done. He’s got fire apparatus — a Type 3 tanker and a Type 6 brush truck — at the ready, filled with water from a system he installed on his property to ensure reliability.

He relies on backup from nearby Hilt Volunteer Fire Company, for which he serves as chief, and plans to “ride things out” with both rural communities until he can safely step down. Former board members help wrangle donations to pay for incidentals, and Avgeris said he works with neighbors to promote fire prevention.

He’s not worried about whether District 5 will “figure things out.” He just figures, “Messes like these don’t clean up overnight.”

“I think they’re gonna be fine. If everybody can just slow down a little bit and let them get things figured out … They need to get station No. 4 restaffed and get everybody feeling good again. Then we’ll annex us in. In the meantime, they’re still helping us out and there’s no reason to rush a bad situation,” Avgeris said.

“Pump the brakes a little bit. Wait ‘til springtime,” he said. “They’ll get it all bolted back together. … I’m up here able to respond to fires, and I’ll help every way that I can.

“Just like we did before and like we’ve been doing all along.”

Reach reporter Buffy Pollock at 458-488-2029 or bpollock@rv-times.com. Follow her on Twitter @orwritergal. This story first appeared in the Rogue Valley Times.