Lewisville Fire Chief Rick Lasky puts others first

by Minnie Payne

LEWISVILLE — Rick Lasky, 47-year-old Lewisville Fire Chief, said that he had much rather talk about his staff, not himself.

“I had rather talk about their [staff] accomplishments,” he said. “My best time is watching my firefighters at work, fixing something, making someone’s hurt go away.”

Lasky was born and lived for several years on the southwest side of Chicago, then moved to LaGrange, Ill. where he graduated from Lyons Town High School in 1979, he said.

“I made a choice when I was 18 years old to play with the White Sox rather than go to college,” Lasky said. “Consequently, I’ve always played catch-up.”

He said that he played baseball with the White Sox two years, and then took a policeman’s job in Willow Springs, Ill., waiting for a fireman’s job to become available.

“My father was a volunteer firefighter in LaGrange,” he said. “Ever since I can remember, I wanted to be a fireman, so I followed in my father’s footsteps.”

He said he attended the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, Ill.

“I taught as a member of the field staff for the University of Illinois-Illinois Fire Service Institute while going to school,” Lasky said. “Half of my classes were taught on campus and half were taught off campus.”

Lasky is well known for his speaking and writing skills, and he said that he attributes that partly to his teaching experience.

“The first class that I taught at the University of Illinois was ‘Instructor Methodology,’ which was simply teaching students how to teach,” he said.

Lasky accepted the Lewisville Fire Chief Job in June, 2000. He said he has 155 people all total on the staff, two assistant chiefs and six different fire stations with three different chiefs.

“I see the firemen as often as I can and praise them both individually and as a group whenever they do a job well,” he said. “My message to the firefighters is to treat people like family.”

He said he was in a life threatening situation once when he was a policeman in Justice, Ill. when someone shot at the police station and once when he was a firefighter in Justice, Ill. when he got lost in a burning building.

“I will tell you that Rick Lasky is one of the most outstanding fire chiefs in the nation,” said Assistant City Manager Donna Barron. “He is what customer service is all about.

“He has instilled in his employees a level of customer service that can’t be touched by any other organization.”

Lasky has been married to his wife, Jami, for 16 years, and they have two children, Rick and Emily.