Richard Fontana is currently Director at the City of New Haven, Office of Emergency Management & Homeland Security where he has been for the past 10 years. He retired from the West Haven Fire Department after spending over 30 years as a Paramedic and Career Firefighter with 2 departments including a Lead Firefighter & Shift Commander for the Sikorsky Aircraft Fire Department. His time now is spent preparing for, and responding to major emergency incidents in New Haven, and also serves as an Operations Section Chief for the Connecticut Department of Emergency Management & Homeland Security Region 1,2 & 5 Incident Management Team.
Mr. Fontana earned his Fire Science Administration Degree from the University of New Haven and went on to earn a Masters Degree in National Security and Public Safety also from the University of New Haven. Mr. Fontana is appointed to serve on the FEMA Region 1 Regional Advisory Committee with the states of CT, MA, RI, ME, NH, and VT.
Mr. Fontana currently serves as the ESF-5 Chair of the Region 2 Steering Committee under the Connecticut Department of Emergency Management & Homeland Security Agency. He further serves as the Region 2 ESF-20 Port Security Chair.
Additionally, Mr. Fontana is a Governor appointed Fire Commissioner for the CT Commission on Fire Prevention and Control. Fontana was nominated and selected in 2013 to represent the Connecticut Conference of Municipalities and is serving his second 3-year term.
In the Media
Rick Fontana ’98 A.S., ’99, ’06 M.S., an adjunct faculty of fire science, discusses the University of New Haven’s national security program, developed after 9/11, which was the first of its kind in the country, as he becomes West Haven’s emergency operations director stepping down from the same position for the City of New Haven.