Category: Q&A

A conversation with Manchester’s fire chief

Ryan Cashin is Chief of the Manchester Fire Department and he spoke about the importance of fire safety. Visit manchesternh.gov/departments/fire for more information on the Fire Department and be sure to check with your local town ordinances and fire departments on specifics for fire pits, fireworks and all things fire-related. (Interview edited to include follow-up questions via email.)

What is the No. 1 thing you can do to keep your home safe from fires?

The No. 1 thing you can do to keep your home safe from fires is to have active, working smoke detectors and to have a fire evacuation plan.

What are the main causes of house or apartment fires?

I don’t think there is one single answer of what would cause those the most. There’s various causes to a house catching on fire and I don’t think any one of them would necessarily be more than the others. I would say one thing that we always want to be cautious of being as careful and thoughtful as possible when discarding smoking materials.

With fire pits, do you need a permit?

You can obtain a fire permit if you have a residential home in the city of Manchester…. It needs to be a contained fire pit, it needs to be a certain distance away from your house. Basically, if you come into the fire department we will go out there and do an inspection and if your single-family house passes the inspection we will give you a fire permit and then you can use that fire permit to have small fires in your backyard. Of course, single-family residence only.

Are fireworks allowed in Manchester?

Fireworks are not allowed within the city of Manchester period. We do regular patrols for fireworks throughout the summer as we get a lot of complaints about them.

Aside from just the noise annoyance, what is the danger of fireworks in Manchester?

Fireworks are a physical danger to people as they can be very dangerous and accidents happen quite often.

Besides fires, what other types of emergencies would a fire department respond to?

Last year we responded to 34,000 separate calls and those would vary from EMS calls to river rescue calls, swift water calls, to hazardous materials to fire alarms to anything that would involve welfare checks, whether that be on someone in a home or possibly a homeless residence. A wide array of calls that we go on.

What are the requirements to become a firefighter?

In order to become a firefighter in the City of Manchester you need to have a couple of certifications. One is your Firefighter I as well as your Firefighter II, which are both state certifications, and [you need to be]a nationally registered EMT…. We give preference here in the City of Manchester to residents that live in the city as well as veterans and also if you have your EMT Advanced.

What is the biggest fire danger in Manchester in the summer?

The biggest fire danger year-round is careless disposal of smoking materials.

Featured image: Courtesy photo.

Children’s Book Author

Regina Tranfa is an award-winning children’s book author and illustrator who is a Kid’s Con New England veteran. You can find her stories My Dad Took Me To Outer Space and My Dad Took Me To Dinosaur Land, as well as coloring books, on her website thetookmeseries.com or on Amazon.

Explain your job and what it entails.

I have created this sci-fi, fantasy, educational series of books where I take my conceptual thinking and I combine it with my illustration style to create stories that create a sense of wonder for both children and adults. It’s kind of like the Magic School Bus too because even as an adult you’re going to learn a lot.

How long have you had this job?

I’ve been at this for 11 years but it’s really the past two years that I’ve really been selling it. It wasn’t until the second book came out with the coloring books that things started to take off at the craft fairs.

What led you to this career field and your current job?

My background is in graphic design and I just still had more of a yearning to create and use my drawing skills and my conceptual thinking, and I’m able to combine that with my views on the world. I self-publish these books. I found out about self-publishing one day when watching the Jeff Probst show. They had this man on there named Dallas Clayton and he’s a children’s book author and writer, and hearing his story was kind of an inspiration to me. That’s an avenue I can go down with my creativity.

What kind of education or training did you need?

Well, my background is in graphic design. I was lucky because the college I went to, the first two years we were not on the computer. It was a lot of hand drawing and working color theory and three-dimensional design, so that helped a lot. And then the design background is where I really got the typesetting skills and the conceptual thinking.

What is your typical at-work uniform or attire?

Just at my drafting table in a comfortable pair of pants and shirt.

What is the most challenging thing about your work, and how do you deal with it?

Getting it done…. I’m very disciplined about my night hours, getting this done. There’s time where I don’t want to do this but no, I still stand in front of the computer, even if it’s 7 o’clock, and get an hour in.

What do you wish you had known at the beginning of your career?

When getting feedback from people, really showing it to adults with artistic backgrounds and adults with non-artistic backgrounds, because I get two different points of view from that. … The second book, when I would show it to children, I showed it to them without the words so they could tell me the story … let the child tell me the story through the images.

What do you wish other people knew about your job?

That writing and illustrating is a lot of work!

—Zachary Lewis

Five favorites
Favorite book: The Neverending Story
Favorite movie: Stardust
Favorite music: Anything that’ll make me run. Alternative and pop.
Favorite food: Gourmet popsicles
Favorite thing about NH: The different seasons.

Featured photo: Regina Tranfa. Courtesy photo.

Sunapee celebrates with a drone show

The Town of Sunapee will be hosting a patriotic drone show at Sunapee Harbor in lieu of a fireworks display on Saturday, June 29, at Dusk. Town Manager Shannon Martinez talks about the innovative holiday event and the American spirit of trying new things.

Why was the decision made to do a drone show?

The initial suggestion came from the community. The community was asking what are the different kinds of innovative ways we can celebrate the Fourth of July without potential contaminants going into Lake Sunapee…. We continue to make decisions about protecting the lake and the quality of our watershed.

How many drones will be involved?

Just over 300.

What type of show is a drone show?

It will be an innovative way using new technologies to celebrate our nation’s birthday. It will be all the things you will get from a normal fireworks show. It’s really homing in on what makes us proud of our nation, what makes us proud to be Americans. It’s the same spirit of the celebration of our nation’s birthday…. It’s an American company with American-made drones with veterans flying drones. It’s a very patriotic way to celebrate what’s important to us. It’s one of those things that can promote community, promote resilience, and just all give us a moment to reflect and pause on what makes us great.

Does it mimic a fireworks show or is it its own thing?

That is the curiosity…. What exactly is a drone show and what does it look like? Absolutely there will be some ‘fireworks,’ there will be, I guess the right word will be ‘characters,’ and there will be things that celebrate and bring us together as a community, celebrate us specifically, like what makes Sunapee proud, that will also be part of the show as well. It’s a blend of animation, if you will.

Will there be music accompanying the drone show?

We are partnering with the local college radio station [Colby-Sawyer College, WSCS] and they will be broadcasting the music that will accompany the drone show. We will have speakers and audio set up in the harbor itself, but for folks who are maybe farther out in their boat, if they just tune in to that radio station they will be able to hear the music that accompanies the movement of the drones.

Are fireworks allowed in Lake Sunapee?

Fireworks are definitely allowed on the Fourth of July. The town ordinance allows people to shoot off fireworks on the Fourth of July without a permit.

What would you say to someone who is not totally on board with a drone show?

It is the ability to try something new and to celebrate in a new and innovative way. Committing to doing something new, what does that mean? That we’re taking away? It can definitely be an additive thing that can still demonstrate our commitment to our country. If you try it once and the feedback from the community is overwhelmingly positive, isn’t that great that we tried something new. If the community finds out that they didn’t love it and we need to go back to fireworks because that is the consensus of the community then we absolutely can do that but I don’t think we lose by being a community that’s willing to try new things together and be open-minded about how it is that technology is changing the way that we interact with one another … drones are a big part of that, it’s a new technology, it’s almost in some ways [we’re] being an early adopter.

Featured image: Courtesy photo.

Manchester Dog Park seeks more members

Samantha McKeon, the Vice President of Development of The Manchester Dog Park Association, a nonprofit organization that relies on the financial support of its members and donors to build and maintain off-leash dog parks in Manchester, spoke about the city’s only park, at 344 Second St. in Manchester, for its furriest residents. Find them on Facebook @ManchesterDogParkAssociation or email them at [email protected].

Can you give a brief history of the Manchester Dog Park?

I’m a newer board member but the dog park was originally established by a small group of individuals in the city of Manchester. There was no public dog park so they started a nonprofit organization to raise funding and to work with the city to lease the land to create a dog park. The Association has been running it ever since. The land that the dog park is on was originally the blacksmith on Bass Island. Unfortunately, there was a fire there and the land, over time, got overrun by debris and trash. It really wasn’t visually appealing, so the city worked with the Association so that we could build the dog park there.

If I wanted to go to the dog park, what would I need to do?

In order to go to the dog park you do have to be a member. We have the applications to become a member on our Facebook page but we also have a link to our email where you can request an application…. Once that application has been completed, it’s just basic information about you and your dog. We also confirm that your dog is all up to date and registered in order to become a member, and then you’ll receive an email with a PIN for the padlock on the gate and then you use that PIN to enter the park. You’re supposed to go between dawn and dusk.

Will the dog park stay members supported?

I know that a lot of the community has been going to regular meetings to try to get the city to build a public dog park. I don’t know when that is going to happen, to be honest, but there is definitely a community push for it. We as an association are just trying to maintain this until that exists. The more sponsorships and memberships we receive the less we can have that membership fee be. Right now the $5 a month is to cover basic maintenance like insurance, poo poo bags, new sand, maintain the ramps, we’re building a water catchment system, so that’s what that $5 goes to….

What can a new member expect if they show up to the dog park?

Right now we have a small community of members but lots of tennis balls. My girl loves her tennis balls so I always make sure there’s a large volume of tennis balls available, Chuckit sticks, toys, A-frame, tunnel, catwalk, dog house. Right now I personally buy gallons of water to keep in our shelter for dog use, but we just ordered the supplies and are working to construct a water catchment system that will replace the water jugs…. The shelter is a little shed… where dogs and members can sit in there to get out of the sun. It’s like a little shaded area with benches and chairs…. We do have regulations against rope toys or bringing in human food into the dog park because it can lead to aggression behaviors, so that is against our rules.

Why is it important to have a dog park in the city?

I think it’s really imperative for dogs to have a place to play and socialize. Dogs are really social animals and they have a lot of energy and we’re in a really urban area where it’s hard to find a place for dogs to run and play and get that energy out, which is really important for their development. … For me, I have a German Shepherd. She has a lot of energy, so I have to take her to the dog park during my lunch breaks, daily, and I don’t have enough time during my lunch break to drive to Hooksett or Hudson, so it’s a perfect opportunity for me to have that time with my girl, let her run around, get her energy out, her zoomies, so that I can continue on with an undistracted workday.

What are some steps people can take to help out the dog park?

We do accept donations. We do have a sponsorship program for businesses in which businesses can give us a donation and we’ll hang a sign in our dog park to advertise the business. …You can email our nonprofit … [email protected]. —Zachary Lewis

—Zachary Lewis

Featured image: Courtesy photo.

Film director

Griffin Hansen is an award-winning director of animated films from New Hampshire who recently released the animated short film Within the Crystal Hills, an imaginative fable about the origins of the famed Old Man of the Mountain. His work can be viewed on YouTube, Instagram and Twitter under the handle @GruppetStudios.

Explain your job and what it entails.

I am an animated film director, which more than anything means I am not an animator … I own and operate my own studio called Gruppet Studios…. I work with very talented artists, not just from New Hampshire but from all over the world to put together some films.

How long have you had this job?

I literally have directed animated films for the better part of three years now, but in terms of making films, working in films and directing … it started in my bedroom in Goffstown when I was 12 years old…

What kind of education or training did you need?

First of all, proud graduate of Goffstown High School, go Grizzlies! As for my job I have a Bachelor of Fine Arts in animation with a concentration in story and concept development, that’s from the Savannah College of Art and Design, and I graduated a year ago last Monday…. You just need the passion to want to work in film. …

What is your typical at-work uniform or attire?

It’s usually going to be my Pitchfork Records T-shirt from Concord, my Alley Cat hat from right down the street from you folks in Manchester or maybe even my Mount Washington Ice Fest hat … and a nice pair of khakis….

What is the most challenging thing about your work, and how do you deal with it?

I would feel that a lot of filmmakers would agree [it’s] making yourself feel like what you’re making is worth making…. To be able to have that passion that I and hopefully many others have for filmmaking, and to keep it lit every day is not as easy as just throwing another log on the fire.

What do you wish other people knew about your job?

I think that there is a prevailing notion, which is slowly dissipating, about animation being … a genre…. Animation is a medium. It can tell all sorts of stories….

What was your first job?

A camp counselor at Camp Mi-Te-Na in Alton, New Hampshire. I worked there when I was 17 and by that point I’d gone to camp there for 11 years.

What is the best piece of work-related advice you’ve ever received?

Everybody has 10 bad films in them, and the sooner you get them out the better. I’m not saying that it’s literally 10, you don’t make your 10th film and now you’re like, ‘Oh great, now I’m perfect.’ But the idea, of course, is everybody has that gunk in their system … the sooner you get out there and get them out, the sooner you can start making stuff you’re really going to be proud of. —Zachary Lewis

Five favorites
Favorite book: Watchmen by David Gibbons and Alan Moore
Favorite movie: Might just be Moonrise Kingdom by Wes Anderson
Favorite music: I’m a huge fan of the Pixies.
Favorite food: Anything from Bova’s Bakery in Boston
Favorite thing about NH: New Hampshire gives you everything you need to grow as a person. It is the perfect soil.

Featured photo: Griffin Hansen. Courtesy Photo.