WINDSOR – Volunteer fire departments in rural towns throughout the Commonwealth are receiving a small boost from Beacon Hill.
Last week, Jack Murray, commissioner of the state’s Department of Conservation and Recreation (DCR), awarded over $50,000 in grant funding to over 40 municipalities statewide through the Volunteer Fire Assistance (VFA) Program.
“Community fire departments serve as the front line and first responders in combating wildfires and forest fires across the Commonwealth,” said Commissioner Murray. “These VFA grants help local departments get the equipment they need, to ensure the continued safety of our communities.”
In the western hilltowns of Hampden County, the towns of Montgomery and Russell received $1,616 and $1,983 through the VFA, respectively.
During the tenure of Governor Deval Patrick, the DCR has awarded more than $520,000 in VFA grants, according to the Lauren Feltch, assistant press secretary for the DCR, adding that these VFA funds have been designated to help volunteer departments with purchasing equipment and supplies, specifically fire retardant, and protective gear.
Other elegible uses for the funds include projects related to firefighter safety, technology transfer and rural fire defense.
“(Fire Departments) are eligible when they’re ‘high risk communities’ – near federal land – and they have to be working in partnership with federal firefighting agencies.” said Feltch. “If they fit the criteria of being in a higher risk area, they’re more likely to fit the need for that money.”
Other key eligibility requirements for a rural non-profit volunteer fire department to be eligible for the VFA grant include providing service primarily to a community of up to 10,000 people, and a staff composed of at least 80 percent call or volunteer firefighters.
Funding for the VFA is provided through the United States Department of Agriculture’s Forest Service and administered by the Department on a 50 percent reimbursement basis.
According to Russell Fire Chief Micheal Morrisey, his department will be receiving $3,980 in total thanks to that 50-50 reimbursement.
“We present a total project that goes through their scoring matrix, and they give you the other 50 percent after you spend the money,” he said. “We’re buying personal protective equipment for wildland firefighting. It’s much more lightweight.”
Morrisey added that the structural gear used by city fire departments is too heavy for fighting forest fires, and that the new lighter gear is among the necessary equipment for a fire department in a high risk area.
“We’ve been fortunate the last four or five years, we’ve been able to buy smaller, lightweight forestry pumps that we can carry up into the woods so we can find either springs or brooks to find water,” he said. “It’s a very good program for small towns.”
Morrisey lists additional factors the VFA considers for increases in funding including a community’s total acreage and the number of forest/brushfires they have had.
“Who is at ‘high-risk’ has to do with what is exposed,” Morrisey said. “For us, we have CSX Rail, the turnpike, Routes 20 and 23,” he said. “We also have homes valued at over $500,000 further out in areas that are vulnerable to fire.”
Mutual aid agreements also make some communities attractive recipients for this VFA grant.
“If you have agreements where you would share the equipment with either Westfield or the hilltowns, as we have in the past, that gives them the cost benefit,” Morrisey said. “When they put this money into a community, it doesn’t just sit there. It’s used by more than one (community).”
