U.S. Sen. Thad Cochran made an announcement Monday that Oktibbeha County firefighters have heard numerous times before: Federal grant money will help the volunteer fire department purchase needed equipment.
Oktibbeha County Fire Services and 15 other Mississippi fire departments received a combined $1.45 million in Assistance to Firefighters Grants, a Federal Emergency Management Agency-administered program, for equipment and training initiatives.
Locally, $174,419 will go toward District 5 Volunteer Fire Department’s purchase of self-contained breathing apparatuses, a thermal imaging camera and a safety device used to fill oxygen tanks.
Oktibbeha County’s seven volunteer departments — Adaton, Bell Schoolhouse, Central, District 5, East, Maben and Sturgis — and the overall fire services system itself has received about $1.5 million in FEMA and U.S. Forestry Department grants since 2012, said Austin Check, a volunteer firefighter who has handled the lion’s share of grant-writing efforts for the department.
The largest grant — a $464,560 allotment — went toward paying volunteers $5 each time they arrived at the scene of an emergency. The remainder paid for tangible equipment, including tanker trucks and firefighting gear.
The county paid about $50,000 in grant matches since 2012 but was not charged for grant-writing fees.
“Residents are definitely getting their money back,” he said, in terms of property taxes paid and the county’s gains from grants. “The extra money helps, but it will never fully replace the normal budgeting that the board of supervisors sets for us.”
Check said future grant applications to secure additional equipment are either active or in development.
“We’re going to come to a point where we have to get an apparatus and expand our coverage with new stations,” he said. “The county’s growing, and the volunteer fire departments have to grow with it.”
Oktibbeha County’s recent $174,419 allotment was the third-highest grant awarded in the AFG program. Only Lafayette County Volunteer Fire Department ($232,228) and Greenville Fire Department ($268,864) brought in more funding.
Mathiston Fire Department was the only other local recipient. It received $97,715 from the grant program.
“Firefighters and other first responders protect and serve us at a great personal risk,” Cochran, who serves on the Senate appropriations subcommittee with jurisdiction over FEMA, said in a release. “I am pleased that these grants will help ensure that they are as well-equipped and well-trained as possible.”
Carl Smith covers Starkville and Oktibbeha County for The Dispatch. Follow him on Twitter @StarkDispatch
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