SPRINGFIELD — Jon Davine, who rose from Northampton fire chief to become the first state fire marshal from western Massachusetts, announced his retirement after a 28-year career. He will officially leave the role on Jan. 22.
As he prepares to exit public service, his focus will be family.
“I’ve been running out the door for 28 years,” he said, adding that his car is packed with enough snacks and clothes to survive a couple of days, and that he usually clocks 35,000 miles a year driving.
His sons have a couple of years of high school left and attend a prep school in New York, and he’s excited to attend their hockey games.
“This job, it makes you miss so much at home,” the Easthampton resident said. “I’m just looking forward to being a dad, and watching them play hockey. My wife, she really kind of gave up her career so I could chase mine, and she stayed home with the boys. It’s time to focus on her, and do some traveling.”
Davine became marshal, the head of the state Department of Fire Services, in 2023 after 25 years with the Northampton Fire Department. He served as chief in Northampton from March 2020 to July 2023.
Gov. Maura Healey’s office cited a long list of accomplishments during his tenure.
“His calm and steady guidance have been invaluable to our crisis planning and response,” said Healey in a statement. “I am deeply grateful for his service and wish him and his family the very best after so many years protecting public safety.”
Davine coordinated chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear and explosive preparedness and staffing for the 2026 World Cup games in Foxborough.
In 2025, the department assigned State Police fire investigators, code compliance officers and support personnel to the response to and investigation of the fire at Gabriel House, a Fall River assisted living facility where 10 people died.
During Massachusetts’ unprecedented 2024 brush fire season, the department carried out hundreds of missions to assist local and state agencies. In 2023, Davine’s office held a symposium on lithium-ion battery fire risks, launching a new data collection tool to improve understanding of the hazards.
Under his leadership, the department consolidated two hazardous materials districts to better serve western Massachusetts, expanded access to free firefighter cancer screenings and opened a new burn building in southeastern Massachusetts to improve training for high-rise fires.
The department also brought Massachusetts into the top 5% of states reporting fire data through the new National Emergency Response Information System.
In a recent interview at the Massachusetts Firefighting Academy’s Springfield campus, Davine said the job leaves an immense psychological toll, which he won’t miss.
When asked what some of the hardest moments had been over the years, he immediately cited the 2025 Gabriel House fire.
“That was just horrible, to walk out in the back parking lot and see a makeshift morgue with 10 of our most disadvantaged folks that perished in that fire,” he said. “I won’t miss that part. I’ve seen enough death and destruction in 28 years, and I don’t need to see another dead body.”
However, he said firefighters share a bond that is one of the most fulfilling aspects of the job. He has met all 351 fire chiefs in the state, one of the best things about being marshal.
“You watch each other’s kids grow up, you watch them get married, and you go to their weddings and see the birth of their children,” he said. “It’s really another family.”
Davine grew up in Adams. His mom said he used to watch the show “Emergency!” every day as a kid, but he’s not quite sure if that’s what led him to become a firefighter.
Instead, he credits a newspaper ad in the Saturday edition of The Berkshire Eagle in 1996.
“That sounds like a fun job,” he said to himself after reading it, and he took the fire exam.
“I did well and was lucky enough to get an interview in Northampton,” he said. “I picked Northampton because I thought it was a cool community and I always enjoyed going down there. I’ll always appreciate Northampton for taking a chance on a kid from Berkshire County.”
He said he was always blessed in the Paradise City to have good mayors and city councilors who supported the work of public safety.
Davine said people can honor the legacy of his and other firefighters’ work by making sure they have working smoke alarms in their homes.
“In this role as the state fire marshal, I think one of the things that frustrates me to no end is going to fatal fires and folks don’t have working smoke alarms,” he said. “Because we work so hard at our level, at the state level. I make videos. We do public safety announcements. We post on social media.”
He said it leaves him asking, “Is anyone really listening?”
“That’s tough to know these people would have had a chance if they had just replaced their batteries or bought a smoke alarm,” he said.
Davine believes recruitment is key to firefighting statewide as the job grows far more demanding. When he started in Northampton in 1998, the department received about 2,500 calls a year. This year, it will respond to at least 10,000.
“That’s a very significant increase, and that’s statewide [trend],” he said.
He encourages young people to consider becoming firefighters.
“What I tell folks is, you’re never going to get rich doing this job, but you’ll make a living. And there’s no greater feeling than leaving someone’s home and having them thank you for making their day better,” he said. “People don’t call the fire department because they’re having a good day, so you show up at some of the worst … and I think an opportunity to make that a little bit better is gratifying.”
“There’s not a lot of jobs that can do that,” he said.
