Outgoing FDNY Commissioner Laura Kavanagh is leaving the department to focus on family and friends, which she says she neglected as the head of the country’s largest fire department, she explains in an online essay.
“The department needs a commissioner who can give it 100% of their all every day,” Kavanagh posted on Medium Tuesday afternoon. “I gave that to the FDNY for 10 years. It’s time for me to give that time back to all the people who made it possible in the first place for me to serve our beloved city for so long.”
Kavanagh has served as the city’s first woman Fire Commissioner for less than three tumultuous years as she butted heads with FDNY staff chiefs. She said her decision to leave was solidified when she stepped back from her job a few weeks ago to “reconnect with my family and friends.”
“While those moments have brought me great joy, they have also brought me profound sadness,” she wrote. “The reunions I missed, the family trips I hadn’t been on, the births and anniversaries I didn’t attend. The nieces and nephews who are growing into people without me. The friends who had fallen in love and gotten married and divorced and promoted, and I wasn’t always able to be there for them.”
“Life is short,” she added. “No place has taught me that more profoundly than the FDNY. Nothing is more important to me than my community. But in this job, it is impossible to give your all to the FDNY and your life.”
A source close to Kavanagh said that the day-in, day-out grind of being Fire Commissioner had become “something of a drain as it would anyone.”
Yet critics claim Mayor Adams pressured her to step down over increased tensions between herself and the department chiefs, some of whom are accusing her of ageism.
In recent months, Kavanagh had “lost touch with the membership,” one FDNY source said.
“She was becoming a bit more of a divisive figure,” the source said. “There were a lot more negative stories coming out of the department and that got the attention of the mayor.”
Kavanagh will remain with the department for the next few months to help the city’s new fire commissioner get up to speed.
On Tuesday, Mayor Adams denied his office pressured her to step down, saying at a press conference she could “hang around” as long as she likes as Fire Commissioner.
“I told her, ‘You can be commissioner as long as you want in the FDNY and if you want to still hang around, there’s other roles I need done,” Adams said at a press conference in City Hall. “When she’s ready to transition to her next role, she’ll come in and say, ‘Eric, I’m ready to transition into my next role.’ If that’s outside the administration or inside the administration, that’s fine with me. She did exactly what I needed for her to do and I think that she’s a great, great leader. And so it’s up to her.”
