Three items listed on the Calvert County commissioners’ consent agenda Tuesday sparked some discussion and requests for clarification. According to two memos to the commissioners from Barbara Warner, the county public safety grants writer, the Solomons Volunteer Rescue Squad and Fire Department has requested $1 million in grant funding from the county to buy a new fire boat.
Warner stated the company’s “apparatus specifications received the approval of the [county’s] chiefs’ council, the fire-rescue-emergency medical service associations and the fire and rescue commission. The company has agreed to a promissory note through which the grant funding would be repaid through service over 20 years.”
in addition to funds to buy a 36-foot vessel, money is needed for purchasing a trailer, a boat lift, pier work plus acquiring the components to equip the boat with response capability to chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear and high yield explosives situations.
Additional funds for the new vessel are being sought by the public safety department through a Port Security Grant Program, which is administered by the U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency.
According to the agency’s website, “The grant provides funding to state, local and private sector partners to help protect critical port infrastructure from terrorism, enhance maritime domain awareness [and] improve port-wide maritime security risk management.”
“Securing this grant would enable Solomons Volunteer Rescue Squad and Fire Department to purchase a chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear and high yield explosives vessel with enhanced capabilities and more advanced technology than the base model,” Warner stated in her memo regarding the federal application.
During the morning session with department heads prior to the board’s weekly meeting, Commissioner President Earl F. “Buddy” Hance (R) expressed concerns about budgeting money for a project with an uncertain final cost.
“This boat keeps growing,” Hance said.
During a presentation added at the eleventh hour to the commissioners’ agenda, Warner explained that the additional components would be essentials for firefighters manning the vessel with a service area that includes two bayside energy utilities — Calvert Cliffs Nuclear Power Plant and the Cove Point Liquified Natural Gas Plant.
“I’d rather have it and not need it, than to need it and not have it,” Warner said of the enhanced capability to respond to explosive situations.
Hance asked Rick Hargrave, the Solomons company’s deputy chief, what would happen if the responders aboard to the fire boat didn’t have this enhancement.
“Our response would be limited to detection,” Hargrave told the commissioners, adding that he didn’t think the boat project’s bottom line could reach the $2 million amount Hance had predicted.
“It seems to me we do need this boat,” Commissioner Catherine M. Grasso (R) said.
Commissioner Todd Ireland (R) asked if the two plant operators had offered to help pay for the new vessel and its proposed equipment.
Hargrave said the businesses had not made any promises of financial resources but had provided letters of support for the grant applications.
Commissioner Mike Hart (R) indicated he was in favor of public safety’s grant application, telling Hargrave, “I don’t want to see you guys in any kind of harm’s way for something that is beyond your control.”
Satisfied with the plans of public safety and the Solomons volunteers, the commissioners, by consent approved the grant applications related to the purchase of a new fire boat.
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