The Fire Department is tightening the screws on who gets to use its hottest property — the letters FDNY.
Taking steps to protect its world-famous “brand,” the department has demanded that dozens of groups of active or retired firefighters using the FDNY name file detailed applications — and pay a $100 fee — to become an “affiliated organization.”
The controversial new policy is aimed at outsiders who rip off “FDNY” and other city-owned trademarks, which rake in an estimated $24 million a year in merchandise sales and licensing fees for city coffers.
The block letters, even more famous since 9/11, are emblazoned on officially sold goods, from caps and T-shirts to the Calendar of Heroes, featuring topless photos of New York’s Brawniest.
But the crackdown has some fraternal groups with longstanding ties to the FDNY and EMS seeing red.
“I find it hard to believe that after 50
years of existence, suddenly HQ doesn’t know who we are,” fumed George Povey, president of the Pulaski Association, whose retirees celebrate their Polish heritage.
Also puzzled is Pete Liander, 65, president of the FDNY Vikings, who said his 200 members march in FDNY uniform in Bay Ridge’s annual Norwegian Independence Day Parade and raise funds and scholarships for families of deceased firefighters.
Liander said his group has to scrape up the $100 fee out of pocket.
“If it’s a one-time fee, it’s not bad. If it’s ongoing, that’s a concern.”
The policy calls for renewal every three years.
Some also bristle at requirements that each group explain its activities, list officers and detail any fund raising, among other disclosures in a five-page application form. Groups must keep a list of members — and show it to the FDNY upon request.
The policy also demands speedy notification to the FDNY of any arrest, “physical altercation” or incident that “would tend to bring the department into disrepute.”
Rank-and-file commenters on the “FDNY Rant” Web site crudely likened the rules to a strip search: “Bend over and spread yer cheeks.”
But the process will grant groups a seal of approval — and “official recognition,” said FDNY spokesman Jim Long.
An FDNY order this month also forbids the posting of material on firehouse bulletin boards except by “approved organizations.”
Paul Mannix, president of Merit Matters, a firefighter group opposing affirmative-action hiring quotas, said the union fought a prior rule banning pamphlets with opinions.
Now, his group can put fliers on tables, but still not on walls.
“It’s censorship. They don’t want our stuff distributed in the firehouse,” Mannix said.
The city is also flexing its muscle to stop hundreds of blogs and Web sites from using “FDNY.” One retired paramedic said the city got Twitter to suspend his account until he changed his Twitter name to omit the letters FDNY.
“It’s something out of Orwell’s 1984,” he said. “They’re control freaks.”
The goal, city officials told The Post, is “to prevent unauthorized users from trading on the goodwill associated with the trademark.”
City lawyers, they say, have halted the illicit use of city logos to solicit charity donations or to sell equipment falsely implying an FDNY endorsement.
Additional reporting by Cynthia R. Fagen