Post 9/11: Working with Law Enforcement and Intelligence Community Partners

SALVATORE J. CASSANO is the former Commissioner of the New York City Fire Department. Mr. Cassano, a Staten Island resident, became an FDNY member in 1969 and served in every uniformed rank, including the highest-Chief of Department. In the aftermath of 9/11, Cassano was immediately promoted Chief of Operations to rebuild the department. Mr. Cassano serves as Senior Advisor, advising the firm on proof of presence at Ground Zero and community outreach.

Mr. Cassano led the United States’ largest fire department with more than 16,000 fire, EMS and civilian members, and an annual budget of $1.6 billion. He spent more than 44 years in the FDNY and held every uniformed rank prior to his appointment by Mayor Bloomberg in January of 2010.

Mr. Cassano served as the FDNY’s Chief of Department – the highest-ranking uniformed officer – from 2006 through 2010, overseeing many of the agency’s most important bureaus including Fire and EMS Operations, Training, Safety, Fire Prevention and Communications. From 2001 to 2006, he served as Chief of Operations – a position to which he was appointed immediately after Sept. 11, 2001.

Both as Chief of Operations and Chief of Department, Mr. Cassano played a crucial role in rebuilding the Department in the wake of Sept. 11 and the loss of 343 members of the Department. In the years that followed, more than 6,800 new firefighters were hired and more than 6,000 others were promoted to various officer ranks as the Department went through a difficult but remarkable resurgence. Under his leadership, the FDNY became better equipped, trained and prepared with the result being the lowest number of annual fatalities from fires in the history of the Department.

Prior to joining the FDNY, Mr. Cassano served in the U.S. Army from October 1965 through July 1967 and was deployed to Vietnam in September 1966.

While a firefighter, he attended John Jay College of Criminal Justice and received a Bachelor of Science degree in Fire Science. Mr. Cassano also received an Honorary Doctor of Laws Degree from St. John’s University in May 2013. In September 2009, Commissioner Cassano was awarded France’s highest decoration, the Légion d’honneur, by French President Nicolas Sarkozy.

Joseph W. Pfeifer was the Chief of Counterterrorism and Emergency Preparedness for the New York Fire Department (FDNY). During his career, he commanded some of the largest fires and emergencies in the New York City’s history: he was the first Chief at the World Trade Center attack on the morning of September 11, 2001, and played a major command role during Hurricane Sandy in 2012, served as an Incident Commander at the Metro North commuter train Derailment in 2013 and assisted in developing the Ebola response in NYC in 2014. He was the founding director the FDNY’s Center for Terrorism and Disaster Preparedness. Since 2001, he worked as a strategic leader assessing the Department’s response performance, identified new budget and policy priorities, helped overhaul management practices, created partnerships to supplement the Department’s existing competencies with new expertise, shaped new technologies for emergency response and developed the FDNY’s first Strategic Plan, Terrorism Preparedness Strategy, and Continuity of Operations Plan. He produced weekly analyses of threats and crisis response throughout the world and is also a Citywide Command Chief, responsible for commanding major incidents.

Chief (Ret.) Pfeifer has spoken both nationally and internationally, including the United Nations General Assembly Conference on Fighting Terrorism for Humanity. He is a Senior Fellow at the Combating Terrorism Center and the Program on Crisis Leadership at Harvard Kennedy School. In addition, he has spoken at the United States Military Academy, Harvard University, Columbia University, Wharton Business School, The Naval Post Graduate School, Tsinghua University in Beijing, and to classes from both the Army and Navy War Colleges. Chief (Ret.) Pfeifer holds a Masters in Public Administration from Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government, a Masters in Security Studies from the Naval Postgraduate School and a Masters in Theology from Immaculate Conception. He writes frequently and is published in various books and journals.

James Schwartz is a Deputy County Manager overseeing public safety and technology in Arlington, Virginia. Until September, 2015 he was Chief of the Arlington County Fire Department. Chief Schwartz joined Arlington Fire in February 1984 and was appointed Chief in June 2004. Prior to his appointment as chief he served in a variety of fire department positions including Assistant Chief for Operations, responsible for all response-related activities, including fire, EMS, hazardous materials and technical rescue response, incident management and operational training. In April 2003, he was assigned to the Office of the County Manager where he served as the Director of Emergency Management until his appointment to Chief.

The Arlington County Fire Department was the lead agency for the response to the September 11, 2001 attack at the Pentagon. Chief Schwartz led the Unified Command effort for the Pentagon incident.

Schwartz serves on the Advisory Council for the Joint Counterterrorism Assessment Team at the National Counter Terrorism Center and is a member of the Department of Homeland Security’s Science and Technology Advisory Committee. He is a member of International Association of Fire Chiefs Committee on Terrorism and Homeland Security which he chaired from 2008 until August, 2014. He is also a member of the Interagency Board on Equipment Standardization a national board that works to strengthen preparedness in the first responder community.

Schwartz has lectured worldwide on crisis response, leadership and preparedness. He is a faculty member at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government where he lectures in the Leadership in Crises Program.

Chief Schwartz is a life-member of Leadership Arlington, an organization that develops and connects leaders in the public, private and non-profit sectors of Arlington County. He received the organization’s Leadership Legacy Award for 2012.

Chief Schwartz graduated from the University of Maryland with a Bachelor’s degree in Fire Administration and is a graduate of the Executive Leaders Program at the Center for Homeland Defense and Security at the Naval Postgraduate School.

Christopher Combs is the Special Agent in Charge of the Federal Bureau of Investigation's San Antonio Division. Prior to this appointment, he was the Section Chief (SC) of Strategic Information and Operations Center (SIOC), the FBI's 24 hour worldwide command and operations center. Before joining the SIOC, Combs was the Assistant Special Agent in Charge (ASAC) of Counter Terrorism at the FBI Washington Field Office (WFO). As ASAC, Combs oversaw the Threats, Domestic Terrorism, Special Events, and Special Operations programs. WFO Special Operations was composed of the WFO Bomb Squad, Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) Team, Evidence Response Team (ERT), Operational Medics (OpMed), Underwater Search and Evidence Response Team (USERT), Hazardous Material Response Team (HMRT), SWAT, Crisis Negotiator Team (CNT), and the Rapid Deployment Team (RDT). Combs received the FBI Director's Award for Distinguished Service to the Law Enforcement Community for President Obama's Inauguration.

Combs was the initial FBI On-Scene Commander at the Pentagon on 9/11 and then served as the FBI representative to Unified Command (UC) for the duration of on-scene operations. Combs was also the FBI representative to UC at the U.S. Capitol during the anthrax mail attacks of 2001. Combs served as the FBI Operations SC for numerous terrorist incidents to include: Holocaust Museum Shooting, Pentagon Shooting, and the Luna Restaurant Bombing in Pakistan.

Combs was a member of the inter-agency writing team that composed the Initial National Response Plan (Initial NRP), the NRP, and the National Incident Management System (NIMS). Combs was also a FBI representative to the White House Homeland Security Council (HSC). During that time, Combs was a member of the Hurricane Katrina Lessons Learned Task Force where he co-authored the White House "Federal Response to Hurricane Katrina Lessons Learned" after action report.

Combs previously served as the Operations Unit Chief of the Terrorist Screening Center (TSC), an SSA in the WMD Operations Unit, and as the SSA of the National Capitol Response Squad (NCRS). Prior to joining the FBI, Combs was a volunteer firefighter for eight years with the Freeport, New York and New Berlin, Wisconsin Fire Departments.

Combs is currently a Senior Fellow with Harvard Kennedy School's Program on Crisis Leadership.