Storytelling Bootcamp: Kalispell Fire Chief’s Journey

Editor's Note: The Daily Inter Lake brought six rising freshmen together this summer for a weeklong storytelling bootcamp where they learned the fundamentals of interviewing and writing a profile story. 

From big cities to small towns, Jay Hagen’s firefighting career has seen it all.

Hagen is the fire chief in Kalispell and has been in the position for over a year. Prior to moving to the area, he worked as a firefighter and chief in the Seattle area for 30 years. He planned on retiring in the Flathead Valley, but when he saw a job posting for Kalispell fire chief, he applied.

“I ended up getting it, so I’m kind of extending my career a little bit longer than I had planned,” Hagen said. “But I’m finding it’s working out really good, because I’m able to do stuff like this and meet people in the community that we otherwise likely would not have met.”

Hagen oversees 43 people at the downtown Kalispell station; a far smaller group than his previous job in Seattle. There, he had over a thousand employees.

“It’s different in a lot of ways,” he said.

“The Seattle metro area has literally hundreds of high-rise buildings. It has transportation systems. It has a fireboat. It’s a big marine hub. Kalispell is a smaller community. Climates are different. It gets quite a bit colder.  They’re similar in that the kinds of things we do are the same, it’s just the scope and the scale of the risk is a bit different.”

Before getting his first firefighting job, Hagen was a student at the University of Montana. There, he worked as a school bus driver in Missoula, where one day one of the other bus drivers said, “Hey, I’m getting married, and I have to move out of my resident job at the fire station, so you should put on that tie and go apply for it.”

He decided to try and wound up finding his passion.  

“I never wanted to do it as a kid,” he said. “I never looked up to firefighters. I really knew nothing about it. I was purely interested in free rent. But once I started doing it, I loved it.”

His first job as a firefighter was a resident job. That meant he was an extra set of hands. He would stay at the fire station from 11 p.m. to 7 a.m. on weekdays, and in a small apartment over the weekends. His job at the station was helping with moving supplies and getting more supplies.

His job as fire chief is drastically different from a firefighter in the field.  

“Regular firefighters, or live firefighters, respond to emergencies and kind of handle everything that’s thrown at them during their 24-hour shift,” he said. “My job is much more strategic, so I’m planning, looking forward, working on budgets, hiring people, training people, ordering supplies and equipment back up.”  

For something he never planned on, going from a bus driver to a fire chief, Hagen found his calling in public safety.

The Inland Northwest Journalism Foundation (INJF) champions ethical local journalism as a vital cornerstone of democracy. Through grants, scholarships, and educational opportunities, we empower sustainable editorial initiatives and support journalists within privately owned media companies. By protecting community voices and preserving archives, INJF works to prevent news deserts and ensure impactful storytelling continues to inform, connect, and inspire communities throughout the Inland Northwest.

If you'd like to support local journalism in northwest Montana, follow this link: Inland Northwest Journalism Western Montana - Innovia Foundation