As a one-time junior firefighter, Mineola Mayor Scott Strauss said he’s long known of the Mineola Junior Fire Department’s dedication to the community.
But they received some formal recognition of that on Wednesday, when the Firemen’s Association of the State of New York recognized the program as the best in the state with its Youth Group of the Year award.
“It’s not what you get, it’s what you give, and these kids give their time like there’s no tomorrow,” said ex-fire Chief Gary Maser, one of the program’s advisers.
Started in 1976, the Mineola Junior Fire Department is one of about 500 firefighter youth programs in the state that were eligible for FASNY’s fifth annual honor.
The junior firefighters have a commitment to community service that sets them apart, said Maser, one of its advisers.
For example, they once collected more than 100 pints of blood for a fire department family member with leukemia and served more than 1,000 Thanksgiving meals in the Rockaways after Superstorm Sandy struck, in addition to holding regular food drives and fundraisers, Assistant Chief Robert Connolly and Strauss wrote in nominating the program for FASNY’s award.
In addition to preparing teens from age 14 to 17 to become full-fledged firefighters, the program aims to instill values such as community spirit and respect regardless of whether they pursue further fire service, Maser said.
“The values that you’re taught, and the community service — you take that wherever you go,” Strauss said.
The program is a major recruitment tool for the fire department, as more than three-quarters of junior firefighters go on to become members in one of Mineola’s three fire companies when they turn 17, Connolly and Strauss wrote.
Four Mineola fire chiefs — including Strauss — and about two dozen line officers have come out of the Junior Fire Department, Maser said. Twelve of the 26 current junior firefighters are set to become full members of the department, he said, including Captain Matteo Itri, 17.
Itri became the first in his family to join the fire service when he entered the Junior Fire Department in 2013, he said. The program has since taught him leadership, responsibility and independence, he said, and he now plans to take the test to become a New York City firefighter.
“God willing, in a couple weeks when I join this company, I know that I want to give back to this community and strive for excellence, and this junior program has really shaped me into a young, great individual who I’m happy I turned out to be,” said Itri, a junior at Mineola High School.
Junior firefighters train at the firehouse every Sunday and Monday and also attend local events, such as parades and funerals, alongside full firefighters, Maser said.
While they cannot fight live fires, they can ride on the fire trucks and assist firefighters when a fire call comes in, he said.
“We have a special brotherhood that no one else has,” Itri said.
The junior firefighters have gotten some international recognition — they traveled twice to Hamburg, Germany, to train with 11 junior fire departments there, and hosted them twice in the U.S.
The program also hosted a delegation of government and fire service leaders from Japan after they visited the New York City Fire Department.
The support the junior program has gotten from the fire department and the village has helped it excel, Maser said.
The advisers are dedicated, too, Strauss said — Maser uses vacation days from his job to go on trips with the junior firefighters. Strauss, an assistant adviser to the program, will accompany them on their annual trip to Lake George in the Adirondack Mountains at the end of this month.
“If we have backing from everybody, we can really give it a push,” Maser said.
