No SAFER Grant This Year: Fall River Won’t Get Funding For Five Firefighters

Fall River Reporter has learned the City of Fall River was not approved for this year’s FEMA Staffing For Adequate Fire and Emergency Response (SAFER) grant that would have paid for five firefighter salaries. While the City has not officially been notified, Fall River Reporter has learned that Fall River was not approved by the President of Fall River’s union.

“Local 1314 Fall River Firefighters were disappointed to learn that we were not awarded the SAFER grant for firefighter staffing this year,” said Michael O’Reagan, the head of Fall River’s Firefighter Union. “We hope that the city of Fall River maintains its commitment to minimum staffing on each apparatus, and we look forward to working with the city on the next SAFER grant in a few months. We would also like to urge the city to hire now from the available civil service list and hold our own city fire academy, as we have done in the past. This will allow our new firefighters to be placed into the companies without waiting for the nearly year-long backlog to get into the MA Fire Academy.”

Per FEMA’s website, “The SAFER grant program was created to provide funding directly to fire departments and volunteer firefighter interest organizations to help them increase or maintain the number of trained, ‘front line’ firefighters available in their communities.”