Latest Round
Of 1st Responder Funds
For Vermont Sets Record

WASHINGTON (Mon., Nov. 3) – Senator Patrick Leahy Monday said the $19 million that Vermont’s first responders will receive in the next round of homeland security funds, announced today, sets a single-round record for the state. 

The new round brings Vermont's total to date to $40,339,000 since enactment of the formula Leahy wrote for the program, which ensures significant grants to smaller states like Vermont to meet the needs of police, firefighters and emergency rescue squads. Adding grants made to Vermont between 1999 and 2001, before Leahy's formula took effect, Vermont has received a total of $41.5 m. under the program.

"These funds exceed Vermont’s earlier expectations, but not our first responders' needs," said Leahy.  "We're still on the learning curve and the preparation curve in anti-terrorism readiness.  Our police, firefighters and medics are doing their jobs well, and it is our job to make sure they have the resources they need to respond when we need them and to prepare for the worst."

The first responder grant program now is administered by the new Department of Homeland Security and the department's Office of Domestic Preparedness Grants Program.  This program helps first responders purchase operating equipment, purchase specialized equipment needed to prepare for bioterrorism, train and pay for overtime. 

Today's $19 million announcement for Vermont includes $4,382,000 from the DHS Law Enforcement Terrorism Prevention Program and $307,000 from the DHS Citizen Corps Grant Program.  The new Law Enforcement Terrorism Prevention Program will specifically help Vermont’s police officers detect, deter, disrupt and prevent acts of terrorism.  The Citizen Corps, a component of USA Freedom Corps, was created in January 2002 to help coordinate volunteer activities to make our communities safer and better prepared to respond to emergency situations.  It provides opportunities for people to participate in a range of measures to increase community readiness and family safety through citizen involvement.

Since 2002, Vermont and other smaller states have been receiving more substantial sums from the ODP grant program because of an all-state minimum formula that Leahy added for the grant program in the USA PATRIOT Act – the anti-terrorism law enacted in October 2001 -– ensuring each state a minimum of .75 percent of total program funding.  Leahy is a senior member of the Senate Appropriations Committee and also of the panel’s new Homeland Security Subcommittee, which led the Senate's work in writing and negotiating the DHS annual budget bill.

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