Water wasn’t always available at the scene of a fire when Jeffrey Hoeflich began his career as a firefighter in Woodstock, and neither was payment for his first shifts as an on-call volunteer.
In rural Illinois in in the 1980’s, firefighters had to bring their own water to put out fires, and they often rode on tailboards, standing on the back of a firetruck, he said.
Now after 39 years of service to the Skokie Fire Department, where he rose to fire chief, he plans to retire Aug.1, leaving the department in the hands of his deputy Nicholas Eschner, who has been named his successor as chief.
With new technology and techniques arising everyday, firefighting has improved a lot in terms of safety standards compared to his start in the ’80s, but new challenges have arisen, Hoeflich told Pioneer Press.
When he was growing up, Hoeflich knew he wanted to follow in his father’s footsteps as a volunteer firefighter with the Woodstock Fire Department. A volunteer could expect to earn between $11 and $13 to respond to a call, and the only person with a paid full-time job in the department was Chief Dick Menzel, according to Hoeflich.
Fighting fires turned into a family affair when he was growing up, Hoeflich said, with his mother serving hot coffee and contributing auxiliary efforts to assist firefighters. His parents also stepped up to administer first aid during public events in the area, he recalled.
“It was a really neat way to grow up and see that type of commitment to service that my parents had, so it felt like a natural fit for me to come to this line of service as well,” Hoeflich said.
When Hoeflich joined the Woodstock Fire Department at age 21 as a volunteer firefighter in 1983, the fire department was split into three branches: a rural district, a city district and a search team. Hoeflich joined the rural district and served on it for three years.
In his early career, Hoeflich’s average calls were to barn fires and car accidents. In one tragic summer, 11 people died in various accidents. He responded to three of those crashes, he said.
“Unfortunately, those weren’t uncommon back then. Personal vehicles are much safer now,” he said.
After receiving words of encouragement from his mentors, Hoeflich said he wanted to continue his career as a full-time firefighter. One day in the mid-1980s, he went to Arlington International Racecourse, where several fire departments conducted physical tests on candidates’ fitness to join a fire department.
In a crowded field between 15,000 and 20,000 applicants, Hoeflich scored high in his physical tests, he said, and got an offer from the Skokie Fire Department. In 1986, he joined the department under the rank of firefighter.
Career in Skokie
“I remember actually driving in down the Edens Expressway and coming into where there’s high rises along the highway, and thinking, ‘Wow… this is really different.’ It’s not what I was used to,” Hoeflich said of his transition from Woodstock, which then had a population under 3,000, to Skokie.
“It definitely added a wrinkle of things that I needed to learn, and fortunately I had good people around me to learn from and develop,” he said.
“Skokie has a good water supply system,” Hoeflich added. “Having hydrants every 200 feet is a huge advantage for fire suppression.”
Hoeflich’s career took off in the Skokie Fire Department. In his first four years with the department, he received training to be a paramedic from St. Francis Hospital in Evanston. In 1990, he was promoted to lieutenant. Three years later, he was promoted to captain, and in 2008, battalion chief and training officer.
Hoeflich was appointed interim chief in 2018, succeeding former Chief Jason Brandt. The Village Board approved Hoeflich to lead the department in 2019.
One of the biggest blazes he helped contain was at Happy Foods grocery store on Oakton Street in December 1989. No injuries were reported.
During his tenure with the department, about two thirds of firefighters in the department received paramedic training to deal with more health-related calls. The department has also gone from receiving an average of 4,500 calls a year in 1986 to 11,000 calls a year in 2025.
Skokie currently has three ambulances, and a fourth one is under consideration, Hoeflich said. During his career with the department, it also earned an ISO Class 1 rating, the highest rating from the Insurance Service Office, an independent organization which measures the firefighting capability of a department.
Aside from safer vehicles on the road, Hoeflich said strengthened fire codes and sprinklers have done a lot to make life safer.
Improved gear and practices have also made firefighters’ jobs safer, he said. Firefighters ride in a firetruck’s cabin, no longer ride on tailboards. The gear firefighters wear is more protective as well, he said.
What isn’t safer, however, are the blazes that firefighters are putting out.
“What is burning in buildings has changed a lot over the years,” he said, referring to plastics and other materials that are toxic when burning. “When there is a fire, it is more dynamic and more intense. The amount of heat that’s generated and the amount of smoke is cancerous,” he said.
Putting out blazes in newer buildings also comes with its challenges, he said, as construction costs have gone up and developers have looked to cut corners on a building’s durability. In one of the blazes he helped put out, the floor underneath him collapsed, causing a spinal injury. It was the most serious injury he sustained on the job, but he was able to heal with physical therapy, he said.
Proactive care
As attitudes have shifted around mental health, the fire department too has shifted to being more proactive about the mental health of its employees, Hoeflich said.
“When I first started we really didn’t talk about it [mental health]… it really didn’t come up,” Hoeflich recalled. “I think people were dealing with things on their own, and when there was a really serious, critical thing, the organization would call in a critical incident stress team… but those were few and far between.”
Nowadays, the department is more proactive in addressing mental health and provides counseling. The department also encourages is employee to work out during their shifts, which at the beginning of his career as a firefighter was not allowed, Hoeflich said.
“I think part of it was that they didn’t want people to get hurt working out. They were afraid if firefighters brought weights in and were lifting eights, that they might get hurt,” he said.
“As time went on… chiefs realized that there were physical and mental benefits to working out. It was something that evolved over time, where we provided equipment and provided time during the day to allow for that.”
Hoeflich’s workout regiment starts at 5 a.m. with an average of 600 to 1,000 steps on a stairmaster, or some other cardio related exercise, he said. Stretching is always on the agenda, with some light weights to work out his core and legs.
The workouts set the tone for the rest of his day, he said, and help relieve stress. Working out in groups can also be good for morale building, he said.
The next generation
Eschner, with 17 years on the job, is slated to take on the reins after Hoeflich retires.
“I know he’s [Eschner] well prepared, and we’ve worked closely together the last several years. I know he’s got a good plan for moving the organization forward, and I’m actually excited to see what he does with the organization,” Hoeflich said.
“We all want to leave it better for the next guy, as we say, and I know that he will do that, just as I’ve tried to do that.”