In the fire station, you basically live a third of your life with your coworkers. It’s like another family, only with a very serious job to do. You make life-and-death decisions together, rely on each other completely and trust that every person on your crew will do their part.
And sometimes, they don’t.
Maybe someone freezes under pressure or can’t keep up with the demands of the job. Those are the hardest moments, when you like someone personally but have to face the fact that they’re not cut out for this line of work. Compassion tells you to help them. Accountability tells you to protect the team and the public first.
I’ve sat across from people I respected deeply and told them it wasn’t working out. That’s not cruelty. That’s leadership. The hardest part of command isn’t the fire. It’s the conversation that happens afterward, when you must balance empathy for the person in front of you with your responsibility to the people depending on you.
That’s where I first learned the balance between compassion and accountability, a balance that applies just as much in public service as it does in a burning building.
When compassion lacks accountability
We see this imbalance in public policy, too. Accountability becomes hard to ensure when decisions are handed off to special interest groups or advisory bodies that mean well but aren’t responsible for outcomes.
There has been a major and important push for inclusivity in policymaking in recent years. That matters. It’s Important. Everyone deserves a seat at the table. But we also have to remember: a seat at the table comes with responsibility for the meal that’s served.
Good intentions don’t always translate into good policy. I’ve seen this firsthand, even currently with Olympia’s Proposition 1 (also known as Worker’s Bill of Rights), well-meaning proposals filled with moral ambition but lacking practical safeguards. Those who back these projects genuinely want to help, but the unintended consequences hurt the very people they aim to help. That’s compassion without accountability, and it leads to chaos.
We see this clearly in our housing policies. Huge amounts of money are poured into low-income housing, but the data and experts tell us we need housing at every level, especially at the upper end of the spectrum. Starter homes already exist, but no one is moving up and out of them. That causes compression and leaves the next generation with nowhere to start.
At a recent real estate forum, a housing developer said, “With the rising costs of land, infrastructure, and energy code requirements, building a single-family home for under $500,000 is next to impossible.” Those costs can be absorbed into a million-dollar home, but not a starter home.
We won’t solve the housing crisis through public dollars alone. We must create space for private development too, with policies that support homes at every level, encourage infill development, and revisit code barriers that make entry-level housing cost-prohibitive.
Without accountability, compassion-driven policies can spiral out of control and fail the very people they’re meant to help.
When accountability lacks compassion
But the opposite is just as dangerous. When accountability is enforced without compassion, it turns into cruelty.
That’s what happened during the Bear Gulch Fire.
Federal agents entered an active wildfire operation and detained 44 certified firefighters, nearly 20 percent of the workforce, without coordination or justification. It was called a “fraud investigation,” but The Seattle Times later confirmed it was about a half-hour timecard discrepancy that had already been corrected that same day.
The arrests violated federal policy, misled the incident commander and disrupted suppression efforts. Containment dropped. Costs ballooned to over $40 million. Public safety was jeopardized, all to make a political point. The crews detained were back on other fires a week later. No crime was uncovered. No safety improved. Nothing was gained, except a lasting sense of distrust.
That was accountability without compassion, and it hurt everyone involved. Leadership says we have to find the balance and we can’t allow that to become the normal.
In response, I introduced the Emergency Responder Protection and Enforcement Coordination Act in Thurston County. It ensures no enforcement agency can enter an active disaster zone without coordination, that responders are treated with dignity, and that due process applies to everyone on the line.
Since then, versions of this act have been drafted as a statewide bill, introduced in Congress, and are being considered by several Washington counties. The principle is simple: protect those who protect us, and do it with clarity, professionalism, and compassion.
Accountability without compassion leads to cruelty.
The lesson of balance
Every leader, whether in a firehouse, a council chamber, or a boardroom, eventually learns that compassion and accountability are not opposites. They are partners.
Lead only with your heart, and you risk chaos. Lead only with rules, and you risk cruelty. The real test of leadership is knowing when to hold firm and when to hold space. When to demand performance, and when to offer grace.
We saw this balance tested during the early days of the pandemic. Businesses were closing, people were scared, and public health orders were changing weekly. As leaders, we had to make decisions that impacted jobs, schools, and basic freedoms. There were no perfect answers.
Some called for total shutdowns in the name of safety. Others demanded full reopening to protect livelihoods. But the best outcomes came when we sought both compassion and accountability, listening to public health experts, supporting small businesses, and being transparent with our communities. We didn’t always get it right, but we tried to act with empathy and responsibility in equal measure.
That is the firehouse code. That is public service. And that is the balance we need if we want to lead with both integrity and humanity.
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Wayne Fournier is a Thurston County commissioner, former Tenino mayor, firefighter and lifelong community advocate.
