Trying to Change the FDNY's Longstanding Lack of Diversity

In Firefight: The Century-Long Battle to Integrate New York’s Bravest, Ginger Adams Otis writes about how many things in the FDNY have changed--but not the scarcity of blacks. New York has about 300 black firefighters--roughly 3 percent of the 11,000 New York firefighters in a city of two million African Americans, an aberration compared to all the other uniformed departments, like the NYPD. She will be joined by Firefighter Regina Wilson, a 16-year-veteran of the FDNY, former president of United Women Firefighters' Association, currently the first woman president of the Vulcan Society, and FDNY Diversity Advocate/lieutenant Michael Marshall, a 33-year-veteran of the FDNY.

Michael Marshall

(Michel Friang)

Ginger Adams Otis

(Debbie Egan Chin)