Kansas City, MO, Taps Seasoned Leader to Head Fire Department

A former interim fire chief with the City of Orlando is the new head of the Kansas City Fire Department, city officials announced Friday.

Craig Buckley, who held leadership positions in the Orlando Fire Department and once worked for the Department of Homeland Security, will replace Fire Chief Ross Grundyson, who is retiring.

“Chief Buckley is a seasoned leader with a deep understanding of what it takes to run a modern fire department,” City Manager Mario Vasquez said in a statement Friday morning.

“Beyond his operational experience, he is committed to developing the next generation of leaders within the Kansas City Fire Department, ensuring the organization remains strong, resilient, and ready for the future.”

Buckley’s appointment is effective on Monday, the announcement said. Vasquez said Buckley would focus on “operational excellence, workforce development, and supporting a culture of leadership at all levels of the department.”

“His appointment reflects the City’s continued emphasis on building long-term capacity within public safety organizations while maintaining high standards of service for residents,” he said.

The announcement comes seven weeks after the city held a public forum featuring the three finalists selected for the fire chief position. Like Buckley, the other two — from Houston and Washington, D.C. — were external candidates.

Sources within the fire department told The Star that city leaders had received strong pushback from the community because there were no internal candidates, women or minorities among the finalists.

In Friday’s announcement, Vasquez thanked outgoing Chief Ross Grundyson for his leadership.

“Grundyson guided the department through an important transition period and concludes his service with a legacy of professionalism and dedication to Kansas City,” he said. “Chief Grundyson has been a trusted and respected leader within the organization. Kansas City is grateful for his service and wishes him the very best in retirement.”

Who is Craig Buckley?

Buckley served as interim fire chief in Orlando from August 2021 to October 2022, according to his resume. He was elevated to that position when Fire Chief Benjamin Barksdale resigned after being accused of punching a 55-year-old man and his daughter in a North Carolina restaurant.

Before that, Buckley had been a deputy fire chief in Orlando since November 2020. Prior to taking the Orlando job, he was an assistant fire chief of the emergency services division for the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority Fire and Rescue Department.

Other jobs during Buckley’s 45-year career, his resume says, were working for the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which is under DHS; the Virginia Department of Emergency Management; and nearly 35 years as battalion chief for the Fairfax County Fire Department in Virginia.

Buckley also has led training classes for fire and rescue departments across the country on issues such as dealing with hazardous materials and emergency responses to terrorism.

He has a bachelor of science degree in fire administration from Columbia Southern University, a private online university based in Orange Beach, Alabama, and a master of science degree from the university in fire executive leadership and emergency services management, according to his LinkedIn site.

Among several honors listed on Buckley’s resume are outstanding performance awards from DHS/ FEMA to Fairfax County Urban Search and Rescue for its Hurricane Katrina response and from Fairfax County Fire and Rescue Department involving the terrorist attack on the Pentagon on 9-11.

Who were the finalists?

The three Kansas City fire chief finalists were introduced at the public forum on Dec. 4. Like Buckley, the others had decades of experience in emergency response.

Michael Marino has worked in fire, EMS, homeland security and emergency management, including serving as Director of Emergency Preparedness for the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority. And Michael Mire has held leadership roles — including assistant chief — and overseen emergency operations in the Houston Fire Department.

Mire also was a recent finalist for Des Moines fire chief, but last month the city announced it had chosen a longtime department employee instead.

Buckley will replace Grundyson, a 30-year KCFD veteran who announced in September that he would retire in January. Grundyson’s three-year term as chief has been marked by the deaths of two firefighters; felony charges against some in his ranks; and a string of lawsuits by employees alleging discrimination, retaliation and harassment.

One of those lawsuits is being heard by a jury this week. Filed in 2024 by fire Capt. Anthony Seymour, the suit alleged that Seymour was retaliated against by department leaders when he reported discrimination and mismanagement concerns.

New chief faces continuing turmoil

Other candidates for Grundyson’s replacement included Deputy Chief Laura Ragusa and Deputy Chief and Fire Marshal James Dean, both of whom have lawsuits pending against the city.

Ragusa, KCFD’s chief medical officer, is the highest-ranking female member of the fire department in uniform. She has two advanced college degrees and has applied for the chief job three times since former Chief Donna Lake retired in January 2023. Dean has an advanced college degree and has been with KCFD for nearly four decades.

Ragusa’s lawsuit, filed in February 2025, alleged that Grundyson had retaliated and discriminated against her after she informed him of what she believed were illegal and unethical practices related to department contracts and reporting requirements for federal reimbursements.

In June, Ragusa was granted permission to amend the suit to include new allegations regarding what she says are the city’s unfair and discriminatory hiring practices in picking a new fire chief.

Dean, who is Black, filed a lawsuit on Dec. 19, accusing the department of “discriminatory, hostile and retaliatory conduct.”

The lawsuit said Dean had applied for the fire chief position when Lake retired in 2023. It alleged that the most qualified internal applicants — and the only ones with graduate degrees — were minorities, including Black men and white women.

“Despite his qualifications, Plaintiff was never interviewed for the Fire Chief position and was never asked to complete a questionnaire or otherwise participate in the selection process,” the suit said.

Instead, it said, the city rejected the entire applicant pool “because it contained no highly qualified white male applicants.”

In December 2023, the lawsuit said, the city removed the “interim” designation from Grundyson’s title, making him the fire chief.

Grundyson, a white male, “did not meet the posted qualifications for the Fire Chief position, including the requirement of possessing a college degree,” the suit said. It also alleged that Grundyson “has publicly expressed hostility toward diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives and declared that such initiatives were ‘going away,’ despite directives from the City Council to create and implement a DEI program with a strategic plan.”

For years, the lawsuit alleged, the fire department had manipulated promotional processes to the disadvantage of Black firefighters. Among the tactics, it said, were altering eligibility criteria, engineering subjective testing processes and making lateral personnel moves to avoid promoting qualified Black candidates.

Dean’s lawsuit also accused KCFD of tolerating racially hostile conduct, including “overtly racist incidents” and failing “to meaningfully investigate, discipline, or remediate such conduct when it is reported by African American firefighters, including incidents involving explicitly racist symbols and conduct during training and academy environments.”

The city’s failure to investigate or correct the conduct has only resulted in emboldening it, the suit said.

“Defendant has continued, and is continuing, the pattern and practice of discrimination and retaliation against Plaintiff, including but not limited to continuing to pass him over for the Chief position, preventing him from even applying for the Chief position, and changing the qualifications to intentionally exclude Plaintiff from the process.”

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