Thoughts On FD ( Now In Debt )

[CusterFireman]

Upton Fire Department (http://www.thenewsenterprise.com/articles/2005/04/06/news/news04.txt)


Now this fire department hopes that fiscal court will help them

Thoughts?

John
Custer Fire
Hardinsburg Fire

[BC79er_OLDDELETE]

Hence the age old recommendations:

- Ask before doing.
- Get permission in writing from someone high enough to give it on any amendments.

Bad part is the excess could have been spent on anything but another truck according to the 2003 PG.

Yes I still have it. Even have the 2001 and 2002 docs. Right next to my working Atari 2600. Blame the Y chromosome. :D

[achief15]

Without the assistance of someone very knowledgeable in working with grants, including the AFG, it might be easy to find yourself in this mess, especially in small rural departments. From reading the article, it doesn't seem that the FD tried to screw FEMA out of funds. They were used for the intended purpose, and the community got the equipment it needed. At least they tried to get an answer before they proceeded. I hope the governing body helps out the FD. In the overall picture, they are helping the community they were elected to serve.

[BC79er_OLDDELETE]

True, I have every belief that there was no fraud intended and only the best interests in serving the community to the best of their ability. The sticking point is that the funds were not used within the scope of the original project, which was the tanker. It is well documented in the PG at that time that excess funds could be used within the scope of the original project (putting a functioning tanker on the street) without approval, just an amendment after the fact. This has since changed of course. So nozzles, hose, flashlights, SCBA, scene lighting, porta-pond, etc, etc all could have been loaded up on with the excess funds. A rescue truck is a different mission than the approved application was intending to solve.

The smart thing to do would be to lobby FEMA and say since they could have bought more stuff from the above list I mentioned, why don't they get the money from the county, deposit it back into the original application's bank, and then purchase said stuff, so that the net result is that the county bought the rescue truck and the excess FEMA funds bought the other stuff. Money is money after all.