Anyone have any thoughts on the fire marshall of a municipality being able to write citations for violations of a county burn ban outside the incorporated areas of the city?
My sheriff has asked if the city fire marshall can assist in writing citations for violations that occur outside the city limits....I can find no authority for this proposition and am wondering if anyone else has addressed this issue.
He is a full-time, salaried, city employee and any offenses would be outside the extra-territorial jurisdiction of the city.
S.O. looking for some help due to numerous compliants and being short-handed.
Thanks

In deep East Texas there is an Arson Task Force and I know that they routinely help each other in their investigations, even in neighboring counties. For instance, Tyler has a great accellerant detecting canine and we would bring him in to do our searches or one of our city arson investigators would do the O &C report for the smaller counties but let the Sheriff of that county sign the warrants.

Could your city fire marshall do the investigation and then have a SO deputy write the citation ?

We have discussed that, and that may be the only solution....The Sheriff asks the FM to assist in investigating unlawfull burning in the county and a deputy actually issues any citation. Just trying to avoid duplication of manpower if possible.

You might consider an interlocal / mutual aid agreement for law enforcement services between the city and the county. Such an agreement would specifically authorize the City Fire Marshal to act as a law enforcement officer in the county (assuming the Fire Marshal is a TCLEOSE peace officer in your city, not just acting as "Fire Marshal" with no peace officer authority as occurs occasionally in some places!)

See Attorney General Opinion No. JC-0532 and keep in mind that the agreement must be between the governing bodies, i.e. County Commissioners and City Council, and not between the Sheriff and the Fire Marshal or Fire Chief.

Hope this helps.