In all, volunteer and professional fire departments throughout the state have landed more than $16.3 million in Department of Homeland Security grants doled out by the U.S. Fire Administration in fiscal 2002, ’03 and ’04 through Aug. 9.

Such good fortune for many of Maine’s smaller fire departments isn’t without some detractors, however.

The thought that a tiny, off-the-beaten-path town such as Waterford could land a $172,800 grant to fund firefighter safety programs has some larger cities chaffing.

Municipal officials in Washington recently asked the federal government to reconsider the way it allocates money given to fire departments. They pointed out that larger cities are centers of government, commerce and tourism and thus more likely terrorist targets.

Maine Sen. Susan Collins, the Republican who chairs the Senate’s Governmental Affairs Committee, has filed legislation intended to mute the brouhaha.

In Maine, the federal money has allowed some departments to acquire apparatus and safety devices and to offer training that many towns couldn’t otherwise afford.

Some communities – Lewiston and Durham, for example – have been quite successful at landing the grants. Others, notably Auburn, haven’t fared as well.

In Lewiston, Battalion Chief George Merrill said the money has allowed the city to upgrade apparatus and offer programs that it wouldn’t have been able to do.

Since fiscal 2001, Lewiston has drawn $488,871 in program grants. Of that, $292,500 paid for Engine 4, which is assigned to the Sabattus Street substation. Another $167,571 is largely paying for a physical fitness program to help firefighters stay in shape to meet the demands of their work. The remaining $28,800 was earmarked for fire prevention programs.

Merrill, noting that Lewiston’s fire budget has been “flat-funded” by city leaders, said the federal grant money “allows us to upgrade old equipment” and operate some programs without putting a pinch on property owners. “The (city’s) taxpayers can’t afford to do it,” he said.

Saving property owners some tax dollars is a concern for Durham Fire Chief William St. Michel as well.

Durham’s $369,596

In early August, Durham was named as a grant winner, looking at $119,306 in federal money this year earmarked for fire operations and firefighter safety. The money will pay for turnout gear, among other things.

But that grant wasn’t Durham’s first, or second. A year earlier the fire department won a $225,000 grant that paid for a new firetruck, St. Michel noted, and previous year that he landed a $25,290 grant to fund fire prevention programs.

“That fire prevention program is wonderful,” he said. It allows firefighters to visit kids in schools and to bring school kids to the fire station a couple of times annually to emphasize various points of fire prevention and safety.

He said he would never have been able to convince town meeting voters to approve spending town tax dollars for the program, so he’s particularly grateful that federal funds were available. That money, he said, allows smaller fire departments a chance to get apparatus, equipment and programs that go far beyond what their towns could afford.

“We’ve been blessed several times,” he said of the grants.

St. Michel credited Chris Logan, a member of the department, for putting together the grant applications that resulted in the apparatus and operating grants.

But he said that despite continued successes, Durham doesn’t have any secret tricks to winning grants.

“I guess we just get lucky,” he said. Still, he noted that a key to winning a grant is applying for them, and carefully documenting needs.

“The day Durham doesn’t have a grant application filed is the day there’s something wrong here,” he said.

Not every city or town wins a grant annually, but sometimes when a department scores, the amount can make its operating budget look miserly.

Waterford’s windfall

In fiscal ’03, the Oxford County town of Waterford landed a $172,800 grant – nearly six times the department’s annual allocation of $30,000.

Matched with $20,000 in town funds, the money paid for a special computerized “burn trailer,” a device that allows firefighters to experience a series of evolutions of live-fire training.

Bill Haynes, the town’s assistant chief, said he and Waterford firefighters wanted to take advantage of the federal grant program, and decided the trailer might make for a good application.

“We could emphasize the mutual aid aspect,” said Haynes.

As of last week, 18 firefighters have been trained in the trailer’s operations, Haynes said. Several of them are members of fire departments in Waterford’s mutual aid district.

He said the trailer requires three trained operators to monitor computers, heat and smoke levels, and other factors as trainees go through their paces. Other fire departments are welcome to use the trailer in Waterford, or Waterford firefighters will haul it elsewhere for training sessions. The town charges a fee to cover its expenses.

Haynes called the acquisition of the trailer a godsend because it offers firefighters a chance to hone their skills. That could save lives.

And without the federal grant program, he said, “There’s no way the town could have afforded it.”

Funding falls

But the complaints by the nation’s larger cities may have already resulted in curbing funds going to more rural states such as Maine. Federal records show that fire departments here received nearly $1.3 million in U.S. fiscal 2001 (Oct. 1, 2000, to Sept. 30, 2001). Then, in the immediate aftermath of the terror attacks, the figure jumped to $4.3 million in fiscal ’02, and it soared to $10.3 million in ’03.

However, after larger cities throughout the country lobbied for changes in the way the fire safety pot is distributed, Maine’s allocation during fiscal ’04 through Aug. 9 slowed to just under $1.7 million. That money is going to 22 fire departments.

Nationally, during the most recent time frame, Homeland Security is paying out grants worth more than $100 million to 1,338 fire departments.

Collins’ proposed legislation could mollify both big cities and small towns.

Her Governmental Affairs Committee oversees Homeland Security’s operations. Collins’ Homeland Security Enhancement Act (S.1245) was unanimously approved by the committee and sent on for action later this session.

Its key points would:

• Establish three sets of criteria for distributing Homeland Security grants. Most funds would be issued according to a risk-based formula, but it also creates a funding baseline for each state and directs discretionary grants to state-defined high threat areas.

• Require states to distribute at least 80 percent of grant funds to local governments and agencies within 45 days of receipt.

• Establish a Homeland Security information clearinghouse where states, local governments and agencies could get grant information and learn how the money can be used.

• Create a national domestic preparedness training center to assist states in training first responders.

• Give states and local governments greater flexibility to transfer Homeland Security grant money for use in training, planning or buying equipment.

“The distribution of federal Homeland Security dollars should not be determined on a scale based on a state’s population,” Collins said. “It should be determined by a state’s risk and vulnerability to terrorist attacks.”

Sobering thought

Maine, she added, “is faced with protecting 3,500 miles of coastline, major shipping ports, international airports and a remote border with Canada.”

The legislation, she said, “would provide states with the predictable, steady stream of Homeland Security dollars they need to defend themselves from terrorist threats.”

And such threats are as real in rural states like Maine as they are in metropolitan areas such as New York, she says.

Portland, she pointed out, was the staging area for terrorists Mohamed Atta and Abdul Aziz al Omari, who with others hijacked American Airlines Flight 11 flying out of Boston then crashed it into the North Tower of the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001.

“It is sobering to realize that, even if our state is never the target of a terrorist attack, terrorists already have used our state as a launching point for their journey of death and destruction,” said Collins earlier this month while calling for Maine to adopt a Joint Terrorism Task Force.