FDNY Municipal Leader of the Year

You couldn’t really call them anonymous. Even before the Sept. 11 attacks, New York’s firefighters were what one writer called, “this city’s working man’s rock stars.” They are admired across the country by firefighters who understand that the challenges presented by the Big Apple outstrip much of what they have to deal with; by women who snap up their annual calendar as if it were a 50-percent-off pair of designer shoes; and by the local media, which, when “fire department” is too long for a headline, substitute “bravest.”

Firefighters have always been among the most visible of municipal employees, in no small part because, when they go somewhere, they make a lot of noise. The symbols grab people — the dalmation, the helmet, the fire pole, the big red fire engine. Maybe it’s because fire is one of our earliest and most deep-seated fears, and they defend us from it. Or maybe it’s because we have an image of the firefighter rescuing the treed kitten, and it reinforces what we already know — that firefighters exist to provide help when and where it is needed.

Still, if firefighters were our blue-collar darlings prior to Sept. 11, afterwards their status elevated to something near myth. As story after story filtered out of the World Trade Center of firefighters struggling valiantly up the stairs toward a hellish scene, they became more than just New York firefighters; they became the face of America, dust-covered and worried, but unquestionably courageous. They became our heroes, and they made us realize, if only for one brief moment, how silly it is when we apply that term to actors and ballplayers.

Sept. 11 made us realize one more thing. It made us understand that, if responding to the needs of the public is the essence of local government leadership, the New York firefighters are the essential choice for Municipal Leader of the Year.

Then and now

The New York Fire Department is made up of 367 individual “companies” — 210 engine companies, with the pumper trucks that most people think of when they think of fire departments; 143 ladder companies; seven squad companies and five rescue companies. All told, it employs more than 16,000 people, many of them from families long associated with the department. Every year, the city’s firefighters respond to nearly half a million fires and more than a million medical emergencies.

The New York Fire Department owes its origins to a partisan battle between the city’s Republicans, insurance companies and police department, and its Democrats, who controlled the city’s inefficient network of volunteer fire departments — and their budgets. Created in 1865 by an act of the state legislature, the department was an attempt to end the bickering. It was called the Metropolitan Fire Department until 1870 when it became, again via state law, the Fire Department of the City of New York — the now-familiar FDNY.

Ten years later, the department experienced its first loss; Captain William Baldwin was crushed when a wall fell during a brewery fire. Since then and before Sept. 11, FDNY lost 774 firefighters in the line of duty. Twelve died in a 1966 fire on East 23rd Street — until the attacks on the World Trade Center, the most at any one time.

A report by the Federal Emergency Management Agency after the 1993 World Trade Center bombing — at the time the largest incident ever handled by FDNY — estimated that the ’93 bombing would have been the equivalent of a 16-alarm fire, though the department has no alarm designation higher than five. No one has yet estimated the magnitude of the Sept. 11 attacks in alarm terms.

That day, 343 firefighters died; fewer than 100 of them have been recovered. Eighty companies suffered some loss; some companies were virtually wiped out. The department also lost 92 vehicles.

It was 8:47 a.m. when the first two alarms sounded. Within 15 minutes, the fifth alarm rang out. Firehouses in every part of the city responded, even though, initially, they had no idea what they were responding to. “There were all kinds of stories,” Fire Chief Brian Dixon says. “The initial response from people indicated that there was a large explosion in the north tower. Some said a plane hit the building. Some said a missile. Companies were dispatched based on that information.”

Once the department was on scene, a command post was set up in the lobby of the north tower. It was moved to nearby West Street when the south tower was hit, and New Yorkers began to realize that the first explosion was no accident.

Around 10 a.m., the north tower collapsed, destroying the new command center where Chief Peter Ganci and Deputy Commissioner Billy Feehan were managing the crisis. Both men were killed.

In fact, most of the dead were killed by the collapsing towers. By going into the buildings as they did, firefighters saved about 25,000 lives, according to city estimates.

Since the attacks, the fire department has promoted 168 officers and firefighters and recruited another 307 in an effort to fill the hole left by those who died. Fire department officials say they have seen an “appreciable” increase in the number of applications by prospective firefighters since the attacks. Speaking to the recruits, Mayor Rudolph Giuliani noted the “good guy” aura that surrounds the city’s firefighters. According to the New York Times, Giuliani told them, “You get to have a feeling that most people wish they could get one time in their life.”

The starting salary for New York’s firefighters is $29,973. Yet, like most public servants, the firefighters are not in it for the money. They are not even in it for the excitement, since the vast majority of their time is spent waiting for something to happen. Mostly they are in it because, every now and then, they get to save a life. In public service, as in life, there is no more noble goal.