Safer Grant Update

SAFER Update

The SAFER grant was once thought to only apply to large full-time departments. While the majority of the funding is handed out to full-time departments, a portion of the monies are reserved for volunteer departments. This is an opportunity for volunteer and paid on call departments to increase their staffing by offering additional perks to their membership. While the first thought would be to pay members more money, the grant committee actually is looking for creative ways to compensate members rather that pay a monetary amount. This funding is to be used to draw new members to the department. It is important to find out why your current membership volunteers and to also find out what it would take to get other members to join. 

Several ideas that were kicked around in our department were...

- Paying a percentage of property taxes for members who live in the area. 

- Health insurance for members and/or their families

- A retirement program

- Hourly pay for classes that are required by the state and/or federal government

Here is the headline from the FEMA website. 

As you may know, the FY2009 SAFER application period is currently ongoing and will end on January 15, 2010. Under the FY2009 program guidance, grants can be awarded to fire departments to rehire firefighters who have been laid off from the fire department due to economic constraints. The AFG program office and help desk have received numerous inquiries regarding the eligibility for grants of those fire departments that have planned layoffs of firefighters, but have not yet implemented the layoffs.

The FY2009 SAFER program guidance states that: "the position must have been the object of a layoff action that was effected between January 1, 2008, and October 31, 2009". We interpret this to mean that a notice must have been issued between January 1, 2008 and October 31, 2009, even if the actual layoff had not occurred by October 31, 2009. An applicant's narrative should be used to explain the circumstances of the lay off notifications, such as the date of notification and the effective date of the lay off.

Department Funding "Grants"

Grants are one of several ways to supplement a departments yearly funding. There are several types of grants with varying complexities to both submitting and the care that is required after the grant has been issued. One popular grant is the national grant from FEMA. These grants can be accessed at  http://www.firegrantsupport.com/ and require little organizational match. There are several types of grants for emergency responders. I have listed below the 4 types of FEMA grants that are available. 

1. The primary goal of the Assistance to Firefighters Grants (AFG) is to meet the firefighting and
emergency response needs of fire departments and non-affiliated emergency medical services
organizations.

2. The SAFER (Staffing for Adequate Fire and Emergency Response) Grant was created to provide

funding directly to fire departments and volunteer firefighter interest organizations in order to help
them increase the number of trained, "front-line" firefighters available in their communities.

3. The Fire Prevention and Safety Grants (FP&S) grants support projects that enhance the safety of

the public and firefighters from fire and related hazards. The primary goal is to target high-risk
populations, firefighter safety and mitigate high incidences of death and injury. Examples of the
types of projects supported by FP&S include fire prevention and public safety education
campaigns, juvenile fire setter interventions, media campaigns, and arson prevention and
awareness programs. 

4. The Station Construction Grant (SCG) was established as part of the American Recovery and

Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA) to provide financial assistance for fire departments to build
or modify fire stations, which will enhance the departments response to their community.

Grants can be written by a member of the organization or can be contracted out to a company to perform the actual grant writing. No matter the route you choose, you as the organization are responsible for the truthfulness of the statements in the grant. 

Language Barrier

While responding to a medical call for chest pain, the questions you will need to ask the patient are going through your head while en route. How long has this been going on? Any history of this type of pain? Ect. While this can be a stressful call for EMS it can be further complicated by language barriers that interrupt our ability to diagnose and treat these individuals.

It is very important that you understand your population and be prepared for these type of situations. It's not critical that all of your responders be fluent in 5 languages, but they should have the tools necessary to communicate on a basic level with the types of patients that they could come in contact with. For example: here is a Spanish to English document that is fairly well laid out. http://www.awcnet.org/documents/EMSSpanish.pdf

Other tools are local high school teachers and college professors that can provide training to your responders.

Training on treatments and procedures are important, but communicating to patients is just as important to the quality of care that they expect to receive.

SOG Standard Operating Guidelines

Formerly known as SOP's ( Standard Operating Procedures), SOG's add useful direction to any situation. From the most mundane standby call, to the most complex multi casualty accident, these guidelines give the officers a standard game plan by which to work from. Several emergency responder departments post their SOG's on-line. For example: you can review a volunteer department's SOG's like Keeler Township Fire and Rescue. (Click on text to view website) Understanding and following SOG's ensure that the game plan that was developed for the situation, is followed as closely as possible.