FDNY issues policy barring bosses from dating underlings after string of sexual harassment scandals 

The FDNY hopes the new policy cuts down on sexual harassment cases.

Of 113 complaints of sex harassment in the FDNY over the last five years, 22 involved subordinates against supervisors, a spokesperson said.

Of those, the department substantiated eight complaints, and two remain under investigation.

Among the scandals, the city in 2020 agreed to pay $350,000 to Staten Island EMT Angelina Pivarnick, who complained that one supervisor had hounded her for sex, and another groped her.

One impetus for the ban arose when a drill instructor at the Fire Academy started dating a probie firefighter, and it became an open secret.

“It made people uncomfortable – but there was no written rule against it,” an official said. The drill instructor was moved to work with other probies

In 2022, the city paid FDNY paramedic Maria Miranda $205,000 to settle complaints that male co-workers and supervisors – protected by the department’s  “boys club” –  bombarded her with dick pics and requests for dates, then retaliated when she reported them by forcing her to clean blood-splattered ambulances.

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Two now-retired FDNY chiefs were arrested Monday on federal charges they accepted $190,000 in bribes to speed up fire safety inspections 

The duo “repeatedly abused their positions of trust as high-ranking officials in the New York City Fire Department … from at least in or about 2021 through in or about 2023 by soliciting and accepting tens of thousands of dollars in bribe payments in exchange for providing preferential treatment,” reads the indictment, which was unsealed in Manhattan Federal Court.

Saccavino and Cordasco took advantage of a backlog on fire alarm and fire suppression system inspections during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, the feds said.

In one instance, Cordasco wrote in a group text, “Are we getting wowed with the price? How much?” about a request to expedite a fire alarm inspection in fall 2022.

Saccavino earned an FDNY salary of $263,478, while Cordasco earned $257,296 annually, the feds say.

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