NEW YORK (WCBS 880) — Former FDNY Commissioner Tom Von Essen, who led the department through 9/11, is retiring from FEMA, putting the wraps on a decades-long career in public service.
The 75-year-old's first job in public service came in May 1970, when he joined the fire department after serving in the U.S. Navy.
"I had so many jobs within the fire department that really created who I am," he said. "I started in a terrific fire house in the South Bronx which was with a crazy group of men that were very, very dedicated and showed me an unbelievable spirit of teamwork. There was no limits to what they would do to help those in that community."
After 13 years, he entered the union. He then went back to the fire house for three years before becoming president of the Uniformed Firefighters Association.
He was appointed the FDNY's 29th commissioner in 1996 by then-Mayor Rudy Giuliani and served in that position until December 2001.
"It was the greatest job I ever had, but with the worse ending that I've ever had, or certainly the fire department has ever had, on Sept. 11 when we lost 343 really terrific people," Von Essen said. "It was the worst thing that could possibly end my career in the fire department because of the grief."
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Fixing the department and keeping it together was one thing, but healing the families was nearly impossible.
"The fire department I knew would survive... but the grief that we had to deal with from those families, the pain and the sufferings that they went through, the funerals," Von Essen said. "There was no way of telling that mother or father, wife, family member, you couldn't give them what they wanted and they wanted to have their loved one back. We just couldn't do it."
The scars from that time remain.
"You put it in a compartment in your heart and you bring it out and you talk about it and you cry," he told WCBS 880's Peter Haskell.
After his time as commissioner, Von Essen joined the private sector serving as a fire and life safety consultant for many organizations, including Honeywell and Underwriters Laboratories.
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In October 2017, Von Essen was named Regional Administrator of FEMA Region II, which is comprised of New York, New Jersey, Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands, by President Donald Trump.
He took on the job a few weeks after Hurricane Maria and has spent his last year helping the region in its response to the coronavirus pandemic.
"I looked at the region's COVID experience with FEMA and I thought, 'Wow, this is actually the worst thing that's ever happened to the city,'" he said. "And I compared it to Sept. 11 because every day the doctors and nurses went to work knowing it was going to be worse than the day before."
He spent most of his 50-year career in public service and sees it as a noble profession.
"To actually help people, feel good when you go home at night that you haven't had to lie about a product that you're selling," Von Essen said.
While his tenure would officially come to a close at the end of the Trump administration, he decided to retire back in June after falling ill with pneumonia.
"My family was breaking my chops to retire," he said. "I'm very happy I took this last assignment in my public career making a difference for people in New York, Jersey, Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands."
Von Essen is proud of his work.
"The public service is really a great group of people," Von Essen said.
Among his many accolades, in 2002 he was made an Honorary Commander of the Order of the British Empire by Queen Elizabeth II.