Jasper’s Director of Protective Services, Greg Van Tighem, has notified the Municipality of Jasper of his impending retirement. The Jasper Local caught up with the Fire Chief to reflect on a career dedicated to serving others. By Bob Covey

In 1979, when Greg Van Tighem showed up in Jasper for the first time, he was like any other wide-eyed 19-year-old getting off the bus in the middle of a snowstorm.

He was stoked.

“I remember getting off the Greyhound and there was two feet of snow on the ground,” he said. “I thought ‘Wow, I’m in paradise!”

With a modicum of a plan to ski his brains out, crash at his brother Kevin’s Cavell apartment and find a job when the money he’d saved ran out, for a while, Van Tighem lived the ski bum’s dream. To bring in cash for rent and lift tickets, he got a job at the Husky gas station, where he eventually would apprentice as a mechanic. At night, if he wasn’t working the door or the DJ booth at the Athabasca Hotel, Van Tighem was playing rec hockey with the Bongs (of all teams). Later, he was recruited to play junior hockey with the Jasper Mountaineers. 

“Don Lonsberry bought me my first pair of new skates,” he recalled.

Today, this rather stereotypical start in a tourism town seems a long way removed from the critical community roles Jasper has gotten used to Van Tighem occupying.
As the long-term fire chief, protective services director, incident command system leader and vice chair of the Jasper Victims Services Unit, Van Tighem has carved out a legacy that will serve the community for decades to come. As a champion fundraiser, marathon solo cyclist and tireless volunteer, his ongoing, off-the-beaten-path adventures have earned him accolades across the continent, including a Governor General’s Meritorious Service Medal in 2016. And just like during community crises such as the 2010 Pyramid Riding Stables explosion and the 2015 Excelsior Wildfire, Van Tighem’s leadership has been called upon to help sail the current storm of the 2020 pandemic. 

Technical knowhow and expertise aside, however, it’s been Van Tighem’s soft skills which have captured the hearts of his colleagues, friends and fellow firefighters. To have been given the gift of empathy, or to have felt supported in a time of uncertainty, or to have been shown that one’s plight matters, is, time and time again, what resonates most with others. 

“I want to be the guy that helps others get there,” Van Tighem said. “I get satisfaction from that.” 

As such, in 1992, similar to organizing a rugby tournament or a Ducks Unlimited raffle, getting involved with the volunteer fire department was a way for Van Tighem to chip into his community.

“I didn’t join the fire department to rescue people or run into burning buildings,” he said. “I joined with the purpose of joining an organization that contributes something positive to the community.”

Twenty eight years, one new firehall, millions of dollars worth of training and equipment, countless responses to accidents, incidents and emergencies, dozens of prescribed forest management burns, hundreds of educational seminars and more charity hotdogs than you can shake a stick at-later, that sense of duty continues to guide him.

“I didn’t plan this path but I have no regrets,” Van Tighem said.

Jasperite Kelly Derksen remembers Van Tighem coming onto the force. Back then, Jasper’s fire department was run by Parks Canada out of the (Heritage) Fire Hall.

“He was always a go-getter,” Derksen said. “He always wanted to go the extra mile.”

Van Tighem came by that ambition honestly. His father was superintendent of the Calgary Catholic School Board, while his mother raised 10 children, five of whom were under six-years-old for a time. One brother became the mayor of Yellowknife for four terms. Another is a former Parks superintendent and well-known author and conservationist. One of his sisters started a women’s shelter in Cochrane, AB, and has worked on the front lines of addictions health. Another, who lost her battle to depression and chronic pain after being mauled by a grizzly bear, wrote about her journey as a survivor in the well-known book The Bear’s Embrace. And another sibling, along with working as a guidance counsellor, coached track and field at the Olympic level.

“I think my parents instilled in us a community mind-set,” Van Tighem said. “We all understood we needed to give something back.”

One of Van Tighem’s most important contributions to the community at large has been his advocacy for mental health, and specifically the development of a culture that promotes addressing the psychological trauma that is often part-and-parcel of being an emergency responder. Fire fighters, paramedics, health care workers and rescue technicians are often asked to perform their duties at accident scenes “that no one should have to see,” Van Tighem said. But up until fairly recently, there were no consistent protocols in place to ensure first responders were receiving adequate care.

“The old way of thinking was suck it up, have a couple of beers and carry on,” Van Tighem said. 

In 2001, Van Tighem made it his mission to change that and, although the policies took years to implement, the formation of a critical incident provincial network, led by mental health professionals, now ensures emergency responders get the help they need and that no one falls through the cracks. That’s particularly significant for Van Tighem, whose younger brother is off work due to Post Traumatic Stress engendered by his fire fighting career and whose aforementioned sister died by suicide as a result of her PTSD.

“It’s in my family, I don’t want to see it in the brotherhood,” Van Tighem said.

What he is looking forward to seeing, however, are new ideas and energy when he finally hangs up the badge in February. Emergency management has changed a lot in his tenure and a fresh outlook from a professional with a different background than his own can only be good for the department, he said.

“The world’s changing,” he said. “The position needs someone with a new outlook.”

That’s certainly what Van Tighem brought three decades ago. A large part of why Jasper’s fire department has been able to transition from a small group of volunteers who responded to the odd fire in Jasper (the highways fell under the jurisdiction of the Warden Service), to today’s highly-trained force which is relied upon to attend emergencies of all kinds, is because Van Tighem himself absorbed any education and training he could access. Not only was he taking time away to attend courses at the Lakeland College Emergency Training Centre in Vermilion, AB, but in between checking Jasper’s smoke detectors and enforcing fire code regulations, Van Tighem also completed his Bachelor of Emergency Services Management (with a 4.0 GPA no less). That education helped him to create a five-year plan for Jasper’s emergency services, ultimately building the case for a new firehall and equipment upgrades which would become the foundation of the protective services department he oversees today. In 2001, when Jasper became a specialized municipality, it was Van Tighem’s legwork that helped the mayor and council of the day negotiate the transfer of the fire services from Parks Canada in a way that would set the new governing body up for success.

“He put everything together,” another long-time JVFB member, Hjalmar Tiesenhausen, said. “He knew how the town should go. We were pretty well on ground zero. He brought the fire department up to the standard of the day.”

Not that his dedication didn’t come with sacrifice. Before the department was able to hire a deputy fire chief in 2005, Van Tighem was on call 24 hours-a-day, 365 days-a-year. That had a cost. Van Tighem’s personal life bore the brunt, as did, at times, his health.

“Being on call all the time, going at 3 o’clock in the morning to a call that turns out to be nothing, then trying to get back to sleep, then you have meetings at 9 o’clock in the morning…it takes its toll,” Tiesenhausen said.

Which is why, perhaps, Van Tighem is so aware of the toll emergency services work can have on brigade members. Twenty-year member Gord Hutton suggests that Van Tighem’s institutional knowledge, his ability to form strong relationships with collaborating agencies and his big picture vision are some of the qualities that will be extremely difficult, if not impossible, to replace. However, it’s Van Tighem’s intuition for the well-being of his fellow men and women which will likely be the most sorely missed. 

“You always have the sense with Greg that he’s got your back,” Hutton said. “That’s reassuring.”

For his part, Van Tighem is reassured that he’s leaving the brigade in capable hands. He’s excited to spend more time at his cabin. To relax. To turn the pager off. 

But he’s also got big plans. He has a “Battlefield” bike tour of Europe high on his bucket list. He has bikepacking routes around Alberta swirling through his brain. He wants to go back up north.

And his services are in demand: as a marriage commissioner, for one, but also as a hunting guide.

“I’m not retiring, I’m rewiring,” Van Tighem said. 

He’s not 19 and getting off the Greyhound again, but make no mistake: he’s stoked.

Bob Covey// thejasperlocal@gmail.com