Exclusive | NYCs first female head lifeguard has urgent message to keep beachgoers safe

She’s been swimming against the tide her whole life — and she’s not stopping now.The Big Apple’s first female chief lifeguard is calling on the city to do more to keep beachgoers safe — claiming it’s done a “poor job” interpreting a local law designed to prevent drownings.Janet Fash, who started out helping to protect Rockaway Beach in 1979 and continued for 40 years, told The Post that for too long, the city has focused its lifeguards on patrolling only certain areas rather than spreading them out and opening more beaches.“New York City still hasn’t figured that out, and you know what, it’s not like they haven’t been told,” Fash, 66, recently said by phone from her home in the Rockaways.Under city law, at least one lifeguard is required to be present for “continuous visual surveillance for reach 50 yards of beachfront or fraction thereof” — meaning there must be one lifeguard for every 50 yards of beach open for swimming or bathing.Fash, the author of a new memoir “Lifeguard: A Love Story,” said the city has done “poor job” of following the law by unnecessarily doubling or tripling up lifeguards in certain areas, leaving other beaches closed.That means certain stretches get overpopulated and that some beachgoers are then more apt seek out less used spots, even if it means swimming unsupervised.“New York City has really done a poor job of interpreting that law,” Fash said.

“They’ll put the lifeguards even on rock jetties, on a chair, while the next [section over, involving] 10 beaches, [is] closed, creating drowning opportunities.”Eight people drowned at city beaches in 2024, according to the most recent data available. That was the highest number in five years, officials said during that time.The city Parks Department did not respond to a Post request for comment.‘Something almost enchanting happens when New Yorkers get to Rockaway’In “Lifeguard,” Fash — who started out at 19 stationed at the city’s mo...