Time Extension on Aerial Grants

[casper809]

My Department received a grant for a quint a couple of weeks ago. We are now in the process of meeting with the various vendors etc. Our grant specialist is telling us that for 2011 vehicle grant awards that there can be no extensions in the time to perform. Basically that the Quint has to be delivered and in service within 365 days of receiving the award or the grant will be lost. The first vendor we met with stated that unless they had the chassis already on hand that it was doubtful they could make the time frame.

Not offering extensions for this kind of project makes very little sense to me. I can understand not wanting a grantee to drag things out for an extended time, but I find it difficult to believe that if both us as the grantee and the vendor make a good faith efforts to complete the project in a reasonable amount of time that an extension would be denied.

I just think forcing an agency to rush out make sacrifices such as buying a stock unit that isn't quite right in order to make the deadline makes no sense. What am I missing here?? Can the vendors be motivated to speed up the build process? Is our grant specialist not giving us the whole story?

[ktb9780]

My Department received a grant for a quint a couple of weeks ago. We are now in the process of meeting with the various vendors etc. Our grant specialist is telling us that for 2011 vehicle grant awards that there can be no extensions in the time to perform. Basically that the Quint has to be delivered and in service within 365 days of receiving the award or the grant will be lost. The first vendor we met with stated that unless they had the chassis already on hand that it was doubtful they could make the time frame.

Not offering extensions for this kind of project makes very little sense to me. I can understand not wanting a grantee to drag things out for an extended time, but I find it difficult to believe that if both us as the grantee and the vendor make a good faith efforts to complete the project in a reasonable amount of time that an extension would be denied.

I just think forcing an agency to rush out make sacrifices such as buying a stock unit that isn't quite right in order to make the deadline makes no sense. What am I missing here?? Can the vendors be motivated to speed up the build process? Is our grant specialist not giving us the whole story?

I'm not going to try and second guess a FPS person who told you that but I believe there may be a misunderstanding or mis-communication here. If I were you I would call to AFG and ask to speak to a subject matter expert and get it straight from their mouth before I would put stock in that response.

[BC79er]

What they're trying to get you to do is get a spec together and get the thing ordered ASAP so it comes in as quickly as possible without being a piece of junk. No one can build an aerial in less than a year and not have issues with it at some point. What they don't want is 6 months of committee meetings, 3 more months of bid ads, then 6 months of design before building even starts. There should have been a basic spec at application time, the 1199A has been up for 2+ weeks, and so basically what they expect is a bid spec out within 30 days of award and vendor chosen within another 30 or less. Then drawings finalized, etc. There's really no "forcing" you to get a truck built within a year, unless it's a basic commercial chassis tanker or something like that. Otherwise the process takes that long, just the nature of the beast. Pretty sure someone was a bit on the over-zealous side, but with good reason considering there are probably some 2009 apparatus awards still awaiting delivery because people procrastinated after the award. I know it's hard to imagine someone in public safety procrastinating... Personally I'm going to start procrastinating tomorrow, maybe....

[BCCB]

I dealt with a 2009 regional training prop grant that kind of dealt with this. The request for proposals went out quickly after the award was announced. Bids were received in timely manner. All of the manufacturers indicated a production time that placed the anticipated delivery at very end of performance period. I contacted AFG immediately as part 2 of the grant was funds for training program delivery using the props. I didn't want to risk losing the grant if a delay occurred. I also didn't want to be stuck with the order for the props if the grant was lost due to the delay. I requested an extension based on this info prior to finalizing the bid award process. I was advised that AFG would not consider an extension that early in the grant period regardless of this situation. I was however reassurred to sign the contracts, remain diligent with our duties and apply for an extension within the final month of the performance period.

We did this and received the extension. The props were delivered about 1 week into the extension. The performance period was extended by 6 month intervals to permit the training evolutions initially awarded.

They understand that things do come up and some delays are unavoidable. However they want the grant funds used and equipment obtained through the program placed in service in a timely manner. You will not get a blank check or open ended extension. As long as you document your efforts and perform in a timely manner, I doubt that you will have a problem.