East Granby Volunteer Fire Department Receives Federal Funding

Editor’s note: We published this story earlier in the week, but here it is again in case you missed it.

Connecticut’s Department of Energy and Environmental Protection (DEEP) has announced that East Granby is among 32 Connecticut volunteer fire departments who will receive Volunteer Fire Assistance Grants (VFA) which will be used to train personnel and purchase equipment aimed at improving their firefighting capabilities.

These funds are provided through a federal program to support fire departments in towns with a population of less than 10,000 people.

The East Granby Volunteer Fire Department will be awarded $2,500.

Volunteer Fire Assistance funds are annually authorized by Congress. Funding passes from the USDA Forest Service to State Forestry offices who award the grants to volunteer firefighter projects statewide.

Most of Connecticut’s funds are directed toward small grants that do not exceed $2,500. A small portion of the funds are targeted toward special training projects in cooperation with the Connecticut Fire Academy in Windsor Locks.

All projects must be completed by February 2016. The funding is a matching 50% reimbursable grant. After the fire department spends the funds they will be reimbursed up to 50%, not to exceed $2,500.

DEEP Commissioner Robert Klee said, “Congress has been very supportive keeping VFA funding in place and we are grateful to administer a program that provides such a critical supplemental service to constrained local municipal budgets. The required matching contribution doubles the public safety benefit in our state.”

During the past fourteen years, the Connecticut Department of Energy and Environmental Protection Division of Forestry has awarded over $1 million in Volunteer Fire Assistance funds to eligible fire departments.

Fire department applications are scored using the following criteria:

• Number of calls the department responded to during the previous year;
• Town’s Insurance Rating, whether there is a plan in place to reduce (improve) their insurance rating;
• Percentage of the fire department budget that is paid for by town taxes; and
• Recent history of receiving the VFA grants.

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