GREAT FALLS — Brad Call has been hired as the new Emergency Management Director for Cascade County; he began work on Monday.
The position had been vacant since for several months, and the county has been operating with an interim director, Scott Van Dyken of the Cascade County Sheriff’s Office.
Cascade County Commissioner Jim Larson said in a news release, “The County is grateful to Scott for the outstanding job he has done, particularly during this pandemic emergency, but we know Sheriff Slaughter is anxious to have him back full-time in law enforcement in the near future.”
Call comes to Montana from Kansas City, Missouri, where he served as the Regional Emergency Management Director for Jackson County. Call’s work involved emergency planning and engagement on the pandemic situation in the Missouri region.
Before his time in emergency management services, Call was an educator in Arizona, both at the high school and collegiate level. In 2013 he began volunteering as a member of the Community Emergency Response Team (CERT), and then went on to earn degrees in emergency management. He earned master’s degrees in Organizational Management from the University of Phoenix and in Emergency Management/Homeland Security from Arizona State University.
In 2016, Call was offered a position with the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) in Kalispell, and then moved to his most recent position in Missouri.
Call said, “I am thrilled to be back ‘out west’ and especially in Great Falls. My wife and six children enjoyed two happy years in Kalispell. When the position in Cascade County became available, I jumped at the opportunity and am thrilled to be back in my adopted home state.”
Chairman Larson said the transition from Van Dyken to Call is underway and may take several weeks with the ongoing pandemic situation.
