Steven J. Kleinberg
Founder/President
Steven J. Kleinberg is the Founder and Managing Director of Kleinberg Funeral Services. Steven has been a licensed funeral director since 1984. His breadth of knowledge, his attention to detail and his passion for helping others has earned him a well -deserved reputation among colleagues and clergy across the country, and most importantly, with the many hundreds of families he has served with fairness and compassion over twenty years in the greater New York City area. His vast experience spans his native South Florida, as well as Chicago and Boston. Steven’s passion for helping others is further exemplified by his service as a New York City Fire Department paramedic (retired) where he worked to support the community.
Steve was born at the tail end of the Baby Boomers generation in Miami, Florida. His career path was shaped as a child by his favorite 1970s era TV shows, Emergency!—about life-saving firefighter partners John Gage and Roy DeSoto of the Los Angeles County Fire Department’s newly created Paramedical Rescue Service and Quincy, M.E.—the crime-solving Los Angeles County Coroner.
As a student at North Miami Beach Senior High School [class of ‘81], Steve was introduced to real-life emergency medicine as a local hospital volunteer, and funeral directing by a classmate whose father owned a Miami Beach funeral home. It was during this period that Steve experienced firsthand the juxtaposition of life and death events. Sparked by an interest in both, it was ultimately his friendship with his classmate that blossomed into a part-time job during senior year and a burgeoning career in funeral service.
Steve attended Miami-Dade College and worked part-time for several Miami Jewish funeral homes, the easiest path to employment for a Jewish kid growing up in a predominantly Jewish area. With the completion of a degree in Funeral Service Education, Steve earned national board certification by the Conference of Funeral Services Examining Boards and following a year-long internship, obtained licensure as a funeral director/embalmer in the State of Florida.
In search of continued personal growth, education, and travel, Steve enlisted in the United States Air Force in August of 1984. Following a four-year commitment with honorable discharge in hand, Steve continued his journey in the funeral profession. Opportunities led him back to his native South Florida, then Chicago and Boston before landing in New York in 1999.
As a mortuary officer for the federal government’s Disaster Mortuary Operations Response Team (DMORT), Steve was deployed to the World Trade Center [9/11] with his Region 2 team to assist in victim identification. Following Hurricane Katrina’s devastation to the Gulf Coast in 2005, Steve served on a second deployment.
In 2004, Steve simultaneously co-founded Eternal Light Funeral Directors of New York in the Sheepshead Bay section of Brooklyn and embarked on a fire department career to fulfill his other childhood dream—to become a paramedic.
A successful second career beginning at age 42, Steve was a full time New York City Fire Department [FDNY] EMT, Paramedic, Haz-Tac Paramedic, and Rescue Paramedic in East New York, Brooklyn along with a candidate for promotion to Lieutenant he declined twice, ended with a quiet transition into retirement in August 2020. Officially, Steve was recognized by the fire department with saving the lives of a dozen people, while unofficially saving substantially more.
Steve’s tenure as president of Eternal Light concluded with his departure from the company in December 2018. In March of 2019, Steve reemerged closer to home as sole practitioner of Kleinberg Funeral Services, where he will continue serving all faiths, traditions and lifestyles with dignity, compassion, and respect well into the future.
Steve is currently licensed to practice funeral directing in New York, New Jersey, and Florida.
Feel free to contact him at steven@kleinbergfunerals.com.
