Veteran Valley Stream firefighter gets his wish

Chief James Ervolino is a longtime member of the Valley Stream Fire Department and a 12-year member of the FDNY.

Micah Danney/Herald

James Ervolino can’t remember when he decided he wanted to be a firefighter. “Since I was a little kid, my parents tell me,” he said.

Ervolino joined as a Junior Firefighter in 1993. He was sworn in to the Valley Stream Fire Department on his birthday in 1998. He always wanted to be chief, he said, running for the first time in 2008 and then in 2010. He was elected second assistant chief in 2012. He was sworn in as the department’s 96th chief on April 7, achieving his longtime goal. The term lasts one year, but the department operates under a “gentlemen’s agreement” that allows chiefs to serve for two.

It isn’t easy juggling his volunteer responsibilities with his day job at an FDNY firehouse in Brooklyn and the demands of his young family. Ervolino and his wife Nicole have two daughters: Josephine, 3; and Victoria, 7 months old. His commitment to the VSFD, whose members filled his wedding party, is unfailing, and he described his participation as something like an addiction.

“If there’s one word I could use to describe what I get out of it, it’s pride,” Ervolino said.

The department responds to roughly 10 full-fledged fires in Valley Stream per year, and Ervolino has earned two citations in his time with Engine Company 3, both for incidents in 2003. One was during that year’s blackout. A handicapped elderly man was trapped by fire inside a home on Wood Lane, the street Ervolino grew up on. Ervolino remembered his close friend, Philip Clemons, working the hose line while others pulled the victim out of the back of the house. The other incident involved a friend who worked for the village and fell out of a bucket truck, and was injured severely.

“We call it organized chaos,” Ervolino said. “You have to keep your cool. If the membership sees you losing your cool, then there’s something wrong and you need to compose yourself for the betterment of the operation.”

His toughest memories also involved Clemons, an NYPD officer who was 27 when he was killed in a motorcycle crash in 2010. That same year, the VSFD lost member Richard Kaufman, 68, to a massive stroke. The deaths devastated the department and struck close to home for Ervolino. “They were two of my biggest supporters,” he said.

As he takes the helm from former chief Charles Brocher, Ervolino looks forward to continuing the work of his predecessors in keeping the operation running smoothly and staying up to speed on the latest training and equipment requirements. “I’ve been fortunate enough to have good leaders before me who’ve set the groundwork,” he said.

Also sworn in on April 7 were First Assistant Chief Jason Croak and Second Assistant Chief Eugene O’Brien.

As Ervolino approaches 18 years with the department, he said he is grateful to work with “a fantastic group of people,” and is looking forward to his new role.

“You only get out of it what you put into it,” he said.