Fournier Commentary: The People Who Stay

When I was younger, I used to hear people talk about “the people who stay.”

Sometimes it was said with admiration, sometimes it wasn’t. There was often an assumption buried inside the phrase that the people who stayed simply never left. That they lacked ambition. That they were afraid of change, that they settled. As I’ve gotten older, I’ve come to believe exactly the opposite. Some of the most remarkable people I’ve ever known are the people who stay, not because they couldn’t leave, but because they chose not to. Or perhaps more accurately, because they chose to come back. I have a deep respect for that kind of intentionality, decision-making, and sacrifice.

I often think about why I always wanted to be one of those people, part of it was undoubtedly family. Different branches of my family have lived in this area for more than 150 years. They homesteaded here. They built lives here. They helped shape the communities that would eventually shape me. Service wasn’t something that felt foreign in my family. My grandfather served as Tenino’s first modern police chief in the 1970s, he ran for County Sheriff in the late 70’s and I like to think he smiled down on me when I was elected to County Office, fulfilling his dream. My father spent nearly three decades serving in the local volunteer fire department, eventually retiring as a battalion chief. Those examples left an indelible impression on me and helped shape who I am today.

As a kid, I watched people answer calls at all hours of the day and night; my dad would nightly respond from home to the Fire Hall and head out to help one of our neighbors in some tragic event all of us in the house waking up to alarm bells from his at home alerting system. I played hide-and-seek in the apparatus bay among the fire engines and grew up reading his Emergency Medical textbooks, turning to the pictures of the most graphic traumas. I watched neighbors helping neighbors, not because they were paid to, but because they believed it was their responsibility to serve the community, they called home.

When I turned eighteen, I joined the local volunteer fire department at the first opportunity I had. It felt natural, in many ways, it felt inevitable, and more importantly, it felt meaningful. For the first time in my life, I felt like I had found something I was supposed to do, a purpose. I immersed myself in it with an almost religious devotion. My first fire academy ended with me receiving the Top Recruit award, and I remember feeling a sense of certainty that is rare in life, I knew this was my calling. Even my last name seemed like a sign. Fournier is derived from the French word for the keeper of the communal oven (the Forno, aka furnace) the person entrusted with tending the fire and keeping it safe.

Twenty-eight years later, there is very little I haven’t experienced in the fire service. I’ve lost friends and colleagues. I’ve seen extraordinary acts of courage. I’ve seen tragedy and nearly every manner of death imaginable. I’ve held countless people as they took their final breaths. I’ve witnessed people at their very best and occasionally at their worst. I’ve been in situations where I could easily not have made it out of alive. I’ve stood beside families on the best days of their lives and the worst days of their lives. I’ve learned lessons about leadership, sacrifice, grief, resilience, and community that could never have been taught in a classroom. For better or worse, that life became part of who I am.

When I look back, I can see that what drew me to the fire service wasn’t simply the work itself. It was the opportunity to serve a place that had already given so much to me. That desire to serve didn’t mean I wanted to stay in one place forever. In fact, I believed that if I was going to come home and contribute, I first needed to leave. So, in my twenties, I did. I traveled all over the country fighting wildland fires, spending seasons living out of a fire engine and moving from incident to incident, sleeping in the dirt. I saw mountains, deserts, forests, and communities of every size imaginable. I learned how different regions approached challenges, how people-built lives in vastly different environments, and how communities functioned when pushed to their limits.

Like many young people, I also wanted adventure. At one point, that desire took me all the way to Alaska, where I worked as a commercial crab fisherman in the Bering Sea. At the time, it was widely considered one of the most dangerous occupations in the world, during the derby fishing days. It was hard work, unbelievably cold, totally unforgiving. Every day was a struggle against the weather, your will, the sea, and sometimes the people around you. Many were among the toughest individuals I’ve ever encountered in my life. It’s the kind of experience that has a way of clarifying what matters and what doesn’t and I thrived in the environment.

Eventually, I found my way to Washington State University, where I pursued my education while also serving with the WSU Fire Department. I intentionally focused on my education before starting a family because I believed that if I was going to return home and build a life of service, I needed to be prepared. I wanted knowledge, credentials, and experiences that would allow me to contribute meaningfully when the opportunity came.

During those years, I also had the opportunity to study abroad in Florence and spend time backpacking across Europe. I wandered through cities, villages, mountain towns, and farming communities that had existed for centuries. I saw places deeply connected to their history and identity, places where generations of families had built lives and traditions that endured long after any one person was gone. Those experiences expanded my perspective in ways I couldn’t have anticipated. I was learning in classrooms, responding to emergencies, traveling internationally, and meeting people whose life experiences were dramatically different from my own. And yet, something unexpected happened, the more of the world I experienced, the more I appreciated where I came from. I remember standing in small rural towns in Italy and thinking how remarkable it would be to live in a place like that. A place with a strong sense of identity, deep roots, historic buildings, agricultural traditions, a community that took pride in itself and then one day it hit me, I already did! The farther I traveled from home, the more clearly I could see it. I began to understand that leaving and returning are not opposites.

Sometimes leaving is what allows you to see home clearly for the first time. That realization changed the trajectory of my life, I knew I wanted to come home, not simply to live there but to contribute there, to help build something, to become one of the people who stay. That decision influenced almost every major choice I made afterward. Over time, I came to understand something important, communities don’t sustain themselves, they require stewardship. They require people willing to coach Little League teams, serve on boards and commissions, volunteer at community events, run local businesses, respond to emergencies, teach in schools, and serve in local government. The things that make a town feel like a community rarely happen by accident, they’re built by people who continue showing up. Year after year. Decade after decade. Most of them never receive much recognition. Many never hold public office. But their fingerprints are everywhere. you see them in successful schools, thriving downtowns, community celebrations, local traditions, youth programs and historic buildings preserved for future generations.

The strongest communities I know aren’t necessarily the wealthiest communities. They’re the communities with the deepest bench of people willing to invest themselves in a place. I’ve seen firsthand what can happen when a community develops that kind of bench strength. That kind of investment compounds over time. One volunteer inspires another. One successful project creates momentum for the next. One generation passes its values to the next generation. And eventually something larger emerges, not just a town but a community.

I think about this often now as I watch my own children grow up. One day they will leave home and begin building lives of their own. I hope they travel. I hope they learn. I hope they experience things I never did. But more than anything, I hope they find a place worthy of their investment. Whether that place is here or somewhere else. Because every community needs people who choose stewardship over convenience. People willing to build rather than simply consume. People willing to leave something better than they found it, the people who stay, not because they have nowhere else to go, but because they understand that places matter. And because they know that the future of any community ultimately depends on people willing to dedicate a portion of their lives to it. I’ve spent much of my life trying to be one of those people, not because I thought I owed my hometown a debt, but because I believed the place that helped shape me was worth investing in.

Looking back, I still do.

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Wayne Fournier is a firefighter, Thurston County commissioner and former mayor who has spent more than three decades working in public safety. His column appears in The Chronicle twice each month.