Terri Wallace is flanked by Chief Bob Junot and Department
President John MacKenzie. Photo from West Bloomfield Fire
Department Facebook page
When Terri Wallace received the West Bloomfield Volunteer Firefighter of the Year Award recently, she made history but she is more concerned with giving back to the community and encouraging others to do so.
Wallace was the first woman in the department’s 65-year history to earn the honor, voted to receive it by her fellow volunteers. She got into the fire department thanks to her husband Bob who joined the West Bloomfield’s department after retiring as supervisor of the grounds at the Canandaigua VA. They have been residents of West Bloomfield since 2003. Realizing that each volunteer is important, she decided to join as well.
Wallace, 53, is an exterior firefighter and a member of fire police. Since May 2013, she performed many jobs with the department like driving a truck to a call, helping hook hoses up to a water supply, directing traffic as a fire police member and dispatching calls on the radio.
In addition to her work on calls, Wallace has been the department’s treasurer for the past two years and serves as the liaison to the Northern Central New York Volunteer Firemen’s Association and is both secretary and treasurer of the Ontario County Firemen’s Association and secretary of the Ontario County Volunteer Fire Police Association.
