As you have seen in earlier emails, we have been successful in protecting fire protection grants from ANY cuts by the legislature in this VERY difficult budget year. The amount you receive should be about the same as last year (the formula has not changed, but changes in value may cause slight variations from last year). There is a change in reporting however. I have attached Section 114 from the bill that shows the total amount appropriated in line 11; and I have also attached the new boiler plate sections 301, and 301(a) which add some new additional reporting requirements. I suspect that the report that you must now file under this will offer additional support for our belief that funding for this service that you provide to the state continues to be woefully inadequate and fails to meet the spirit and letter of Act 289.

Once again, thanks again for your tireless and relentless pursuit of this. To be sure, the conference report needs to gain the concurrence of the full House and Senate, and be signed by the Governor. Nevertheless, I am cautiously optimistic that we have this item in a relatively secure position for the coming fiscal year (during the fiscal year at a time like this when the state revenue structure is so unstable, we still must fight against mid-year executive orders and negative supplemental budget bills).

As we have discussed, this state still needs to come to grips with a more efficient and effective revenue structure – until that happens, this and so many other items on which we rely remain at risk.

Thanks again for all your leadership and support for this issue !!