Montville ― Matthew Suarez, elected earlier this month as the new chief of the Mohegan Fire Company, does not want to be complacent.

“You don’t want to get stagnant and stay in one place. You always want to be striving to learn that next job. It was like that in the military,” the 22-year U.S. Navy veteran said. “I’m like that now.”

He said the volunteer fire service should be no different.

“We have a lot of members that get comfortable where they are,” Suarez said. “And we’ve been pretty good as of late at motivating people to take more classes, to get qualified more. And I think that’s the direction we need to keep going.”

In December, the 53-year-old Suarez will have spent 16 years with the department, including serving as lieutenant, captain and assistant deputy chief.

Suarez succeeds Corey Gaetano who served six years as chief. Suarez defeated him 17-7 in a vote by volunteer firefighters this month.

“I’’m glad to have the opportunity to move us forward into the future, and not forget where we came from,” he said.

Under his leadership, Suarez said the department will look to return it to its roots of providing “quality service to the community,” whether it be on medical or fire calls, or responding to accidents. One of the major priorities he wants to focus on is recruiting younger members.

“I mean, it’s a problem everywhere,” he said. “It’s not just a Mohegan, or a Montville problem. That’s a problem at every department,” he said.

“But quite often, I look around and realize I’m one of the younger guys at an accident and I go, ‘Oh man. We’re in trouble,’ ” he said, laughing.

“But that’s what you get during the day,” he said. “Guys are at their job. They’ve gotta feed a family. You know?”

Suarez said he has some ideas for recruitment, including introducing an EMT program into the schools.

“I’ve seen it work in other towns in western Connecticut, where the school helps out as far as offering an EMT program that counts as school time. They do it during the day, while they’re in school,” he said. “Even if only a small portion of them go on to become actual EMT’s, it’s more than we have now.”

Suarez said he recognizes that while such a program could greatly benefit the town’s volunteer service, everything costs money and the town would need to be on board. He said their might be a “better shot” of offering the program in the technical schools, which are attended by a lot of children in town.

Asked about politics between paid and volunteer staff, Suarez called it a “hot topic.”

“I get along great with the career staff. And I support them 100%. Because without them, I mean we can say we cover our calls, but, you know, if we’re all at work during the day, then nobody’s covering those calls. Except those guys.”

Suarez said since serving in officer roles at Mohegan, he’s tried hard to help new paid firefighters get settled in at the station. After a week or two, he said he asks them if there’s anything they think could be improved.

“Because they’re a fresh set of eyes in the building,” he said. “And they may have better ideas. And I’m all about listening to those better ideas.”

Aside from being chief, Suarez said he works full time as a government employee at the Naval Submarine Base.

“I go in at 5:30 every morning,” he said. “Most volunteers work full-time jobs, whether it’s day shift or night shift. Most of us are on days. So that’s where it comes in handy to have the career staff around.”

d.drainville@theday.com