City receives $2.7M federal grant to hire 15 firefighters

By Daniel Kittredge
Posted 7/20/16

The city will receive more than $2.7 million of a $17.7-million federal grant to fund the hiring of 15 new firefighters, the state's congressional delegation announced last week. The funding is provided through the Staffing for

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City receives $2.7M federal grant to hire 15 firefighters

Posted

The city will receive more than $2.7 million of a $17.7-million federal grant to fund the hiring of 15 new firefighters, the state’s congressional delegation announced last week.

The funding is provided through the Staffing for Adequate Fire and Emergency Response (SAFER) grant program, administered by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) in cooperation with the U.S. Fire Administration. According to the announcement, the grant will cover the cost of the new hires for the next two years.

Providence will receive the bulk of the award – roughly $15 million to fill 80 firefighter positions. The announcement indicates the 95 total positions in the two communities “were vacated due to normal attrition in the department[s] and not backfilled due to economic hardship.”

“The additional firefighters in both departments should help improve response time, reduce the number of line-of-duty injuries, and enhance safety for both citizens and firefighters,” the announcement reads.

The Cranston department, which fields and average of 15,000 calls annually, has a current roster of 195. Included in the current year’s budget was funding to hire seven new firefighters, were the grant funding not received. Now, the full 15 positions can be filled.

In June, the Cranston department received a nearly $119,000 award through FEMA’s Assistance to Firefighters Grant Program (AFG) to purchase four new cardiac monitors/defibrillators.

Mayor Allan Fung, through the grant announcement, applauded the efforts of U.S. Sen. Jack Reed and the rest of the state’s congressional delegation in securing the funding for the new hires.

“The addition of 15 firefighters funded by this grant will allow us to meet the needs of our community without increasing the burden on our taxpayers … I am also very grateful for the hard work of our Fire Chief William McKenna, Assistant Chief Bernard Patenaude, and their staff for successfully completing the application process for this highly competitive grant program,” the mayor stated.

Reed – a senior member of the Senate Appropriations Committee, and leader of an annual workshop on federal fire department grants – in the announcement stated the grant will “help fire more frontline firefighters and enhance public safety while easing budget constraints.”

U.S. Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, U.S. Rep. James Langevin, and U.S. Rep. David Cicilline also applauded the grant award and the Cranston and Providence departments through the announcement.

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