Albemarle County Fire Rescue has been awarded a $1.88 million FEMA Staffing for Adequate Fire and Emergency Response grant to hire, train and deploy 10 full-time firefighters.
“Albemarle County is committed to a safe and healthy community for all of our residents,” said Ned Gallaway, Chair of the Albemarle County Board of Supervisors. “As our community continues to grow, we continually look for opportunities to ensure we’re maintaining quality services. We are grateful to FEMA for this grant award to support our fire rescue department during this challenging time and to the staff for their successful application in this competitive grant process.”
Of the 10 grant funded positions, five will be used to offset the costs already appropriated in the Fiscal Year 2022 budget for daytime firefighters to staff North Garden Volunteer Fire Company. The other five positions will be used to reliably staff Earlysville Volunteer Fire Company and Stony Point Volunteer Fire Company.
“I can’t thank the ACFR staff enough for their persistence and hard work in putting together another successful grant application,” added ACFR Fire Chief Dan Eggleston. “This $1.88 million grant, along with a previous $1.9 million grant, will allow us to address significant gaps in service while deferring cost.”
ACFR conducted a hiring process earlier this year and generated an eligibility list that will now be used to fill these 10-grant funded positions. The new hires will go through a six-month recruit school starting in January 2022, followed by a paramedic school. The positions will be fully deployed to the field by January 2023.
The SAFER grant program was created to provide funding directly to fire departments and volunteer firefighter interest organizations to help them increase or maintain the number of trained, “front line” firefighters available in their communities.
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