7-11 Questions and No Grant

[OakLevel]

Got the 8 questions on 7-11 and the 1199A link added to our successful 2003 grant, but no 2005 award yet.....

Anyone else go back to 7-11 with no word yet?

I have called and there is no hold up - just no award yet.

[BC79er_OLDDELETE]

Not entirely unusual. The questions and 1199A usually indicate order of award, but not necessary. I'm guessing you did confirm receipt of your answers and all of that good stuff, so it's on the horizon, just not quite there yet. Kinda like a long-term Xmas Eve.

[WrightofGCVFD]

I can't go back quite that far, we recieved our questions and 1199A on 7/27/05, recieved confirmation of the 1199A on 8/8/05.

No award yet, but if you look at some of the postings in the Federal FIRE ACT Grants & Funding forum, some of these folks were getting the same paperwork back in middle-late June. So, yes I am a little disappointed we haven't been awarded yet, but then again I am expecting to be awarded towards the middle-end of the award rounds.

Obviously, that is assuming that there is some correlation between your paperwork date and the award date.

[ltseidl11]

Recieved our questions as well on 7/27 and still havent heard anything.

[Greenacres2]

Since there is no way to confirm that the answers to the 10Q's have been received, what is the polite amount of time to wait before calling to make sure they got them? In light of the current situation in the south, I have no desire to call at all unless it's absolutely necessary.
earl

[BC79er_OLDDELETE]

A week or so. Usually they'll send them again within a week if they don't hear a response back, or if they get lost or something. So most of you that got them way back when would have gotten 2 more emails and probably some phone calls if they didn't get them.

The order is somewhat set by score, but obviously the vehicle awards are going faster, so they re-ordered the list to put them out faster. They do that if there are a bunch of departments from the same area consecutively in the list. They try and make sure that awards go out to as many states within each round as possible.

At least it will be all over by October 31st now, sure beats waiting until Feb 2006.

[WrightofGCVFD]

A week or so. Usually they'll send them again within a week if they don't hear a response back, or if they get lost or something. So most of you that got them way back when would have gotten 2 more emails and probably some phone calls if they didn't get them.

The order is somewhat set by score, but obviously the vehicle awards are going faster, so they re-ordered the list to put them out faster. They do that if there are a bunch of departments from the same area consecutively in the list. They try and make sure that awards go out to as many states within each round as possible.

At least it will be all over by October 31st now, sure beats waiting until Feb 2006.

Thats for sure, it gets a little numbing to check every Friday for 30 or 40 something weeks, when you are not denied right off the bat.
I've been hearing that they are only going to issue about 7000 awards this year, anybody else hear the same?

With 2919 awards so far that leaves about 4000 awards left to go, plenty of hope yet for those of us still waiting.

[Greenacres2]

With 2919 awards so far that leaves about 4000 awards left to go, plenty of hope yet for those of us still waiting.

Could be more like 2600 left to go--their press releases have all referred to "approximately 5,500 rewards". And i sure hope the estimate of 130 SAFER awards is low--i'd like to think we have a shot at a retention grant--but i think we may have been a little more creative than acceptable in our application.
earl

[BC79er_OLDDELETE]

Earl has it right, there will only be around 5,400 awards. There was only $650 million in the pot this year versus the $750 mil in the 2 previous years, so that will account for the "missing" 2,000 or so awards we're used to.

Unfortunately, 130 on SAFER isn't an estimate.

[k3twpfire]

Any idea how many of those 130 grants are for recruitment & retention?

[BC79er_OLDDELETE]

From what I've been able to gather, not many, but there will be a few. At an average of $500K per award, I'd say there will be a lot of hiring going on. The total award for hiring 1 FF is $100K over the 5 (4 since last one is no fed funds), so the average will be the hiring of 5 FFs per award.

I would guess that the awards on the hiring side will be smaller cities that are only running 2-3 FFs per truck, and more suburban combo/volunteer departments because those 1 or 2 additional FFs on full-time will be a huge part of the force. So I don't see FDNY or Houston picking up FFs this way.

I know I posted it way back when, but R&R is a very tough sell compared to hiring. The simplistic view is there will be 1-2 FFs in the station, or the hope that 3-4 come from home because of the R&R program. Assessments were very key in both of these programs. R&R required a lot of research, and a very airtight narrative that would convince the reviewers that the proposal would increase manpower to a substantial degree. I thought the app for my department was pretty dang good, but I think every one of my clients that went for hiring have a better chance than us.

Since it is the first year, it will definitely be interesting to see how things go.

[k3twpfire]

Didn't at least 10% of the funds have to go to recruitment & retention?

[Greenacres2]

Without revisiting the guidance, 10% sticks in my mind--specifically for volly R & R if i recall correctly. Almost every volunteer R & R application from our region that i KNOW of focused on adding a retirement plan. That idea had no appeal in our department, so we tried to be a bit original. If it worked, i may share, if not...i'll become an ostrich!!
earl

[BC79er_OLDDELETE]

PG:

The law requires that we set aside ten percent of the
available funding for hiring firefighters for volunteer and mostly volunteer fire
departments.

We are also required to direct at least ten percent of the total amount of available
funds for the recruitment and retention of volunteer firefighters.

$6.5 million minimum for dept's with more than 50% volunteer for projects to hire FFs, and $6.5 million minimum for R&R.

What I meant by the above is that they are not going to be over the R&R amount by much. To venture a guess, take an average of half the hiring amount since there is no matching requirement, and even at $250K per project, that's only 26 departments.

Not a lot of love coming from the SAFER. While it's nice that they want to up it to $115 million next year, it's happening at the expense of the AFG, which will be reduced to $585 million if nothing changes through the end of the month.

Call your Congresspeople. Take advantage of the press releases, phone calls, and big foam checks. It's late in the game but that doesn't diminish the needs of the American Fire Service.

But for this instant, God bless the NOFD, NOPD, and everyone else devastated by Katrina.

[dixiechicknc]

Brian,
On the topic of SAFER, I'd like to think I wrote a pretty dang good narrative for my home departments recruit/retention myself...LOL. We'll see. I helped out on quite a few, and also did a few hiring. So, who knows.

If I had to review and score, I'd say my more compelling narrative/project was my home dept's recruit/retent. since it included college $, a HS recruit plan, marketing pieces, project coordinator, etc. Pretty comprehensive project overall...Again, though, only time will tell. Good Luck to all!

[Greenacres2]

Between Brian and Alana, i'm suddenly feeling woefully inadequate. Must be developing a case of narrative envy.

I went for community visibility and department pride (jackets & shirts), and travel expense funds to training. Our dept scrapes to pay tuitions but not transport, lodging or meals. Didn't know where to head with it all, and it was before i discovered this site. As my bride, the died in the wool Cubs fan always says...Wait 'til next year!!
earl

[BC79er_OLDDELETE]

We went for a regional marketing campaign as the big seller. Several departments in the area take out of district volunteers as long as they sleep at the station, but the public doesn't know about it. Many FFs and EMTs move into the area from other parts of the country and want to keep active, but don't know where they can go. Other folks always wanted to, but think since they're covered by a paid department they can't do it from home, so the plan is to let them know about it. We have about 20 members that come from out of the area already. All area departments (~100) would have contact info in the mass media campaign if they wanted, it would be open to all. TV, radio, papers would all be hit. It's actually one of the cheaper line items we have even with hiring a professional marketing company.

We also added length of service awards, and after X number of years each member gets additional training dollars for whatever they want related to the fire service: college, fire academy, other training schools that we can't pay for. The longer you're in the more annual money, that's the draw. Or so we hope.

We already have full uniforms with Class A, izods, t-shirts and coveralls. When we're scheduled on duty we have to be dressed for success. 5,000 calls a year require the professional look.

Jeez Earl, if you're getting narrative envy just talking about the apps, I'd hate for you to actually see some of my good stuff.

[dixiechicknc]

Earl...as a former Sales and Marketing Specialist, that's definately my background/speciality, and comes in handy 'thinking' outside the box' on things like Fire Prevention, and hopefully, SAFER. (Just like Brian has his programming)

I do think on things like FP alot of it's in the Marketing, how you 'sell' the project, not only in the narrative, but also to your community. I do get upset when FDs ask me what funds they can apply for (anytime, not just FP/S), and I say tell me what you're doing now for FP, and they give me the blank, no clue (cause its nothing) stare.

It's one thing if you're department is poor and broke. It's another if you just don't do anything. It's something that should be done, year round, and as a Parent, it's something I believe strongly in. Think a little creatively, to get the concept of Fire Prevention to the kids in your community or your senior citizens. Don't just duplicate others work and you'll be fine.

I'm flattered by your compliments, though. We might all strike out. 130 isn't many...

[Greenacres2]

Thanks Alana. Haven't struck out yet though.

Poor and/or broke is often and excuse instead of a reason for doing nothing--in any endeavour. With no excess budget we're still able to make a few visits each year to the elementary and pre-schools in our township. Stop, drop and roll doesn't need any budget to be taught. It's also great to hear 2nd graders describe their evac/meeting plans that their families developed after we visited them in 1st grade. Way cool.

As Yogi Berra said--it ain't over 'til it's over!!
earl