[House Hearing, 116 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
THE ROLE OF AFG AND SAFER GRANTS
IN COVID-19 RESPONSE
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HEARING
BEFORE THE
COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE, SPACE,
AND TECHNOLOGY
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED SIXTEENTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
JUNE 12, 2020
__________
Serial No. 116-73
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Printed for the use of the Committee on Science, Space, and Technology
[GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Available via the World Wide Web: http://science.house.gov
__________
U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
40-594PDF WASHINGTON : 2021
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COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE, SPACE, AND TECHNOLOGY
HON. EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON, Texas, Chairwoman
ZOE LOFGREN, California FRANK D. LUCAS, Oklahoma,
DANIEL LIPINSKI, Illinois Ranking Member
SUZANNE BONAMICI, Oregon MO BROOKS, Alabama
AMI BERA, California, BILL POSEY, Florida
Vice Chair RANDY WEBER, Texas
LIZZIE FLETCHER, Texas BRIAN BABIN, Texas
HALEY STEVENS, Michigan ANDY BIGGS, Arizona
KENDRA HORN, Oklahoma ROGER MARSHALL, Kansas
MIKIE SHERRILL, New Jersey RALPH NORMAN, South Carolina
BRAD SHERMAN, California MICHAEL CLOUD, Texas
STEVE COHEN, Tennessee TROY BALDERSON, Ohio
JERRY McNERNEY, California PETE OLSON, Texas
ED PERLMUTTER, Colorado ANTHONY GONZALEZ, Ohio
PAUL TONKO, New York MICHAEL WALTZ, Florida
BILL FOSTER, Illinois JIM BAIRD, Indiana
DON BEYER, Virginia FRANCIS ROONEY, Florida
CHARLIE CRIST, Florida GREGORY F. MURPHY, North Carolina
SEAN CASTEN, Illinois MIKE GARCIA, California
BEN McADAMS, Utah THOMAS P. TIFFANY, Wisconsin
JENNIFER WEXTON, Virginia
CONOR LAMB, Pennsylvania
C O N T E N T S
June 12, 2020
Page
Hearing Charter.................................................. 2
Opening Statements
Statement by Representative Eddie Bernice Johnson, Chairwoman,
Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, U.S. House of
Representatives................................................ 6
Written Statement............................................ 7
Statement by Representative Frank Lucas, Ranking Member,
Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, U.S. House of
Representatives................................................ 8
Written Statement............................................ 9
Witnesses:
Chief Gary Ludwig, President and Chairman of the Board,
International Association of Fire Chiefs
Oral Statement............................................... 10
Written Statement............................................ 13
Mr. Roy L. ``Sandy'' McGhee, III, District 11 Vice President,
International Association of Fire Fighters
Oral Statement............................................... 21
Written Statement............................................ 23
Mr. Steve Hirsch, Chair, National Volunteer Fire Council
Oral Statement............................................... 29
Written Statement............................................ 31
Discussion....................................................... 37
Appendix: Answers to Post-Hearing Questions
Chief Gary Ludwig, President and Chairman of the Board,
International Association of Fire Chiefs....................... 72
.
THE ROLE OF AFG AND SAFER GRANTS
IN COVID-19 RESPONSE
----------
FRIDAY, JUNE 12, 2020
House of Representatives,
Committee on Science, Space, and Technology,
Washington, D.C.
The Committee met, pursuant to notice, at 12:30 p.m., via
Webex, Hon. Eddie Bernice Johnson [Chairwoman of the Committee]
presiding.
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Chairwoman Johnson. And before I deliver my opening
remarks, I'd like to note that we're in unusual circumstances
under which this meeting is taking place today, but pursuant to
House Resolution 965, today, the Committee is meeting
virtually. This is not how we would prefer to conduct business,
but we are in the midst of a global pandemic, and until I am
convinced that we can return to work on a more normal basis,
we'll continue to try to meet remotely so that we can play our
part in slowing the spread of COVID-19.
I want to also announce a couple of reminders to the
Members about the conduct of this hearing. First, Members
should keep their video feed on as long as they are present in
the hearing, and Members are responsible for their own
microphones, so just be mindful that you probably have a little
bit more responsibility than usual than if we were in the
regular meeting space. Please keep the microphones muted unless
you're speaking.
And finally, if Members have documents they wish to submit
to the record, please email them to the Committee Clerk, whose
email address was circulated prior to the hearing. But if you
don't have it, we can make sure that you do get it.
I welcome you to the Science, Space, and Technology
Committee's first virtual hearing. Today, we're discussing the
impact of COVID-19 on the fire service community and how we can
best leverage existing Federal programs to expedite assistance
to fire departments during the pandemic. I appreciate our
witnesses being here under these unusual circumstances, but
these are very important issues, and we look forward to your
testimony.
In 2018, medical aid calls totaled 64 percent of all the
firefighter and EMS responses. Actual fires only accounted for
4 percent of those calls. In addition to medical emergency
response the expanded mission of the fire service includes
hazardous materials response, enhanced technical rescues, and
active shooter incidents. All of these missions require
additional equipment, additional training, and additional
staffing.
COVID-19 is exacerbating what was already a chronic lack
of sufficient funding for fire and EMS response, given their
broad mission. So, during the COVID-19 public health crisis, we
are relying more than ever on our Nation's fire service to
provide emergency medical response. For those suffering from
severe cases of COVID-19 disease, firefighters are sometimes
the first health care workers they come in contact with. Sadly,
many emergency responders have arrived to find such individuals
have already passed away in their homes.
Whether they are attending to the sick or to the families
of those who have just passed, firefighters are risking their
own health to serve their communities. Lack of adequate PPE
(personal protective equipment) has led many of our
firefighters to fall ill with COVID-19, and some, sadly, have
died. These deaths represent a failure by the policymakers to
provide adequate protection to our first responders.
The Assistance to Firefighters Grant, or the AFG program,
was established in 2001 to provide Federal assistance directly
to local firefighting and emergency response efforts. Today,
this funding is needed to purchase PPE and for other equipment
and training needs related to COVID-19.
In response to the crisis, Congress provided $100 million
in the CARES Act for supplementary funding to the AFG program.
FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Agency) received more than
2,000 applications requesting a total of $128 million in
funding. We understand those awards will be announced soon.
But, unfortunately, this funding only begins to address the
tremendous need.
The House-passed HEROES Act proposed an additional $1
billion in supplemental funding for the AFG program and its
partner program, the Staffing for Adequate Fire and Emergency
Response, or the SAFER program. I look forward to today's
discussion and hope that we can understand more clearly what we
are facing.
COVID-19 has resulted in significant cuts to local and
State tax revenues and other sources of support for fire
departments, leaving some departments facing the hard decision
to lay off firefighters in the midst of this crisis. We remain
in the middle of this dual health and economic crisis at the
same time that our country is confronting its long history of
racial injustice.
On top of that, we are in the early days of an ominous
wildfire and hurricane season. This is a time of great
uncertainty. Yet through it all, our communities are counting
on us to ensure that our Nation's first responders have the
tools and support they need to do their job well and safely. I
look forward to today's discussion of how Congress can help
ensure these brave women and men have the sources and resources
that they need.
[The prepared statement of Chairwoman Johnson follows:]
Good afternoon and welcome to the Science, Space and
Technology Committee's first virtual hearing. Today we are
discussing the impact of COVID-19 on the fire service community
and how we can best leverage existing federal programs to
expedite assistance to fire departments during the pandemic. I
appreciate our witnesses being here under these unusual
circumstances but these are very important issues and we look
forward to your testimony.
In 2018, medical aid calls totaled 64% of all firefighter
and EMS responses. Actual fires only accounted for 4% of calls.
In addition to medical emergency response, the expanded mission
of the fire service includes hazardous materials response,
enhanced technical rescues, and active shooter incidents. All
of these missions require additional equipment, training, and
staffing. COVID-19 is exacerbating what was already a chronic
lack of sufficient funding for fire and EMS response given
their broad mission.
During the COVID-19 public health crisis, we are relying
more than ever on our nation's fire service to provide
emergency medical response. For those suffering from severe
cases of COVID-19 disease, firefighters are sometimes the first
health care workers they interact with. Sadly, many emergency
responders have arrived to find such individuals have already
passed away in their own homes.
Whether they are attending to the sick or to the families
of those who have just passed, firefighters are risking their
own health to serve their communities. Lack of adequate PPE has
led many of our firefighters to fall ill with COVID-19, and
some, sadly, have died. These deaths represent a failure by
policy makers to provide adequate protection to our first
responders.
The Assistance to Firefighters Grant, or AFG, program was
established in 2001 to provide federal assistance directly to
local fire fighting and emergency response efforts. Today, this
funding is needed to purchase PPE and for other equipment and
training needs related to COVID-19.
In response to the crisis, Congress provided $100 million
in the CARES Act for supplemental funding to the AFG program.
FEMA received more than 2,000 applications requesting a total
of$128 million in funding. We understand those awards will be
announced soon. Unfortunately, this funding only begins to
address the tremendous need. The House-passed Heroes Act
proposes an additional $1 billion in supplemental funding for
the AFG program and its partner program, the Staffing for
Adequate Fire and Emergency Response, or SAFER program.
COVID-19 has resulted in significant cuts to local and
state tax revenues and other sources of support for fire
departments, leaving some departments facing the hard decision
to lay off firefighters in the middle of this crisis. We remain
in the middle of this dual health and economic crisis at the
same time that our country is confronting its long history of
racial injustice. On top of that, we are in the early days of
an ominous wildfire and hurricane season. This is a time of
great uncertainty. Yet through it all, our communities are
counting on us to ensure that our nation's first responders
have the tools and support they need to do their job well and
safely. I look forward to today's discussion of how Congress
can help ensure these brave women and men have the resources
they need.
Thank you.
Chairwoman Johnson. And so now--is Mr. Lucas--yes, I see
him. Mr. Lucas, I recognize you for an opening statement.
Mr. Lucas. Thank you, Chairwoman Johnson, and good
afternoon from the Science Committee hearing room in
Washington, DC. Several Members are present and participating
in today's virtual hearing, and I can assure you we are all
following CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention)
guidelines.
In approving virtual hearings, the Rules Committee
recommended the House Committees make accommodation to ensure
health and safety of participants. Several Committees have held
either in person or hybrid-style hearings in recent weeks, and
many of the Members of this Committee are here in Washington
today, and we have plenty of room. And this hearing could
easily have followed suit.
I want to first thank and also urge my good friend,
Chairwoman Johnson, to continue to accommodate the in-person
participation of Members moving forward.
Meanwhile, I want to welcome and thank our witnesses for
joining us today in our first official hearing in nearly three
months. We are fortunate to have three of the Nation's top
first responders on the panel to discuss fire and EMS
department needs during the COVID-19 pandemic.
As COVID-19 continues to spread in pockets around the
country, our Nation's first responders are the frontlines and
vulnerable to contracting the virus. Fire and medical
emergencies don't stop during a pandemic. While many Americans
have sheltered at home for the last few months, our first
responders don't have that option. We must ensure they have the
resources and the equipment they need to stay safe, healthy,
and on the job.
Firefighting activities and funding are primarily the
responsibility of State and local communities. However, for the
past 18 years, the Federal Government has awarded competitive
Federal grants directly to local fire departments and emergency
medical services organizations to help address a variety of
equipment, training, and other related needs. The AFG awards
provide funding for equipment and training to ensure the safety
of our Nation's first responders. SAFER awards help the
departments hire, recruit, and retain firefighters to help
maintain and increase the number of trained firefighters in
local communities.
This Committee led reauthorization of those programs two
years ago out of recognition that it was in the national
interest to have well-staffed and equipped fire departments in
the case of a national emergency. We didn't anticipate then
what we would be now. Who would have guessed that COVID-19 is
now testing the Nation's emergency preparedness system?
The CARES Act, which passed on a broad bipartisan basis,
included $100 million to supplement funds to help fire
departments buy or being reimbursed for personal protective
equipment. I understand that FEMA's processing those
applications and will be making awards in the next few weeks. I
know that is not as fast as many of us would like, but for a
program not designed to make emergency awards, they've moved
with rapid speed.
We have witnesses today from organizations and fire
departments large and small, Oklahoma, Kansas, Illinois. All
departments have different needs, and I look forward to their
input on how we can improve the safety of our men and women on
the frontlines during this crisis.
I thank the witnesses for being with us virtually and for
their service to our Nation. And with that, Madam Chair, I
yield back.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Lucas follows:]
Thank you, Chairwoman Johnson. Good afternoon from the
Science Committee hearing room in Washington, DC. We have
several Members here participating in today's virtual hearing,
and I can assure you we are all following CDC guidelines.
In approving virtual hearings, the Rules Committee
recommended that House Committees make accommodations to ensure
the health and safety of participants. A number of Committees
have held either in-person or hybrid-style hearings in recent
weeks. Several of the Members of this Committee are here in
Washington today, and we have plenty of room. This hearing
could have easily followed suit. I urge my good friend
Chairwoman Johnson to continue to accommodate the in-person
participation of Members going forward.
Meanwhile, I want to welcome and thank our witnesses for
joining us in our first official hearing in nearly three
months. We are fortunate to have three of our nation's top
first responders on the panel to discuss fire and EMS
department needs during the COVID-19 pandemic. As COVID-19
continues to spread in pockets around the country, our nation's
first responders are on the front lines and vulnerable to
contracting the virus.
Fire and medical emergencies don't stop during a pandemic.
While many Americans have sheltered at home for the last few
months, our first responders don't have that option. We must
ensure they have the resources and equipment they need to stay
safe, healthy, and on the job.
Firefighting activities and funding are primarily the
responsibility of states and local communities. However, for
the last 18 years, the federal government has awarded
competitive federal grants directly to local fire departments
and Emergency Medical Services (EMS) organizations to help
address a variety of equipment, training, and other related
needs.
A-F-G awards provide funding for equipment and training to
ensure the safety of our nation's first responders. SAFER
awards help departments hire, recruit, and retain firefighters
to help maintain and increase the number of trained
firefighters in local communities. This Committee led the
reauthorization of those programs two years ago, recognizing
that it is in the national interest to have well-staffed and
equipped firedepartments in case of a national emergency. We
didn't anticipate then what that would be, but COVID-19 is now
testing our nation's emergency preparedness system.
The CARES Act, which passed on a broad bipartisan basis,
included $100 million in supplemental funds to help fire
departments buy or be reimbursed for personal protective
equipment. I understand that FEMA is processing those
applications and will be making awards in the next couple of
weeks. I know that is not as fast as many of us would like, but
for a program not designed to make emergency awards, they have
moved with rapid speed.
We have witnesses today from organizations and fire
departments large and small, from Oklahoma, Kansas, and
Illinois. All Departments have different needs--and I look
forward to their input on how we can improve the safety of our
men and women on the frontlines during this crisis.
I thank the witnesses for being with us virtually, and for
their service to our nation.
I yield back.
Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much, Mr. Lucas.
If there are other Members who wish to submit additional
opening statements, your statements will be added to the record
at this point.
And at this time I'd like to introduce our witnesses. Our
first witness is Fire Chief Gary Ludwig. Chief Ludwig is the
President and Chairman of the Board of the International
Association of Fire Chiefs (IAFC). He is also the Fire Chief
for Champaign, Illinois, Fire Department. Prior to his service
in Champaign, Chief Ludwig served in the city of St. Louis for
25 years and retired as Chief Paramedic of the St. Louis Fire
Department. He has also served 10 years as Deputy Fire Chief
for the Memphis Fire Department.
After Chief Ludwig is Mr. Roy ``Sandy'' McGhee. Mr. McGhee
is the International Association of Fire Fighters (IAFF)
District 11 Vice President, representing over 27,000
firefighters in the State of Oklahoma, Texas, and the Panama
Canal Zone. He is in his fourth term and was first elected in
2004. As an IAFF Vice President, Mr. McGhee provides advice,
consultation, and organizational resources to over 300 local
affiliates in District 11. He served 25 years as a firefighter
in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and retired from the fire department ranked
as Fire Captain.
Our third witness is Mr. Steve Hirsch. Mr. Hirsch
currently serves as Chair of the National Fire Volunteer
Council. Mr. Hirsch is also Training Officer for Sheridan
County Fire District #1, Thomas County Fire District #4, and
Grinnell Fire Department, all of which are 100 percent
volunteer fire departments. Mr. Hirsch also currently serves as
first Vice Chair of the Kansas State Firefighters Association
after serving as Secretary from 2000 to 2018.
As our witnesses should know, you will each have 5 minutes
for your spoken testimony. Your written testimony will be
included in the record for the hearing. When all of you have
completed your spoken testimony, we will begin with questions.
And each Member will have 5 minutes to question the panel.
And I will start with Chief Ludwig. Chief Ludwig, you can
begin your testimony.
TESTIMONY OF CHIEF GARY LUDWIG
PRESIDENT AND CHAIRMAN OF THE BOARD
INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF FIRE CHIEFS
Mr. Ludwig. Thank you, and good afternoon, Chairwoman
Johnson, Ranking Member Lucas, and distinguished Members of the
Committee. I am Chief Gary Ludwig, the President and Chairman
of the Board for the International Association of Fire Chiefs
and the Fire Chief of the Champaign Fire Department in
Illinois. I appreciate the opportunity to testify at today's
hearing.
The Nation's fire and EMS (emergency medical services)
departments are at the tip of the spear in the fight against
COVID-19. Regardless of whether they are from career,
volunteer, or combination departments, fire and EMS personnel
provide aid every day to victims of COVID-19.
When a person is suffering from COVID-19 calls 911, fire
and EMS personnel must meet them in their homes, provide aid,
and transport them to the hospital. Fire Chiefs across the
Nation are working tirelessly to protect their staff by
supplying them with the necessary N95 masks, emergency gowns,
and other lifesaving supplies.
Nevertheless, 55 fire and EMS persons have died in the
line of duty from exposure to COVID-19, and more than 1,000
fire and EMS personnel have been infected. We're having trouble
getting critical medical--or critical masks, gowns, and
sanitizing agents. Our firefighters were not originally
considered a high priority for PPE or for testing, which led to
quarantining firefighters while they awaited results. We are
also concerned that we will again run into obstacles to
inoculating our staff when vaccines are developed.
Fire departments budgets are getting crushed by COVID-19
pandemic. When firefighters are exposed to COVID-19, we
quarantine them for 14 days or at least until the test results
come back. We cover these staffing shortfalls with overtime and
backfill pay. Also, the cost of basic N95 masks and sanitizing
equipment has increased. Meanwhile, local budgets are squeezed
due to stay-at-home and social distancing orders. This
situation results in reduced services to communities and
layoffs.
The IAFC surveyed its membership in May. We found that
fire departments expect to suffer $16.9 billion in budget
shortfalls across the Nation in 2021 as a result of the
economic downturn. Our survey also found that approximately
1,000 fire department personnel had been laid off already and
that an additional 30,000 firefighters may be laid off in the
next 12 months. If there is a second wave of COVID-19
infections, fire departments will need Federal assistance to
fight this plague.
The IAFC thanks Congress and the Trump Administration for
this help this spring. The CARES Act included a special
appropriation of $100 million for the AFG program that covered
COVID-19 expenses. FEMA has moved quickly to open the
application period for these grants, which closed on May 15.
DHS (Department of Homeland Security) also waived requirements
for fiscal year 2019 and 2020 SAFER grants to make it easier
for fire departments to hire firefighters to help their
communities. I also recognize the leadership of the U.S. Fire
Administration in being a helpful partner during this pandemic.
As the Nation continues to fight the COVID-19 pandemic and
its economic effects, the Nation's fire and EMS departments
still need Federal assistance. Fire departments will need
financial assistance to weather the economic storm and serve
their communities. The HEROES Act includes $500 million each
for the AFG and SAFER grant programs. The AFG funds will help
fire departments purchase PPE and sanitizing equipment for
COVID-19 response. The SAFER grant funds will allow fire
departments to rehire and retain firefighters. The legislation
also waives local match and other requirements to help fire
departments apply for these funds. We ask the Senate to pass
these provisions. We also request $50 million for the SIREN
grant program at HHS (Department of Health and Human Services)
to support rural EMS.
Fire departments must be top priorities for receiving PPE
and sanitizers. Congress and the Administration must work
together to ensure a secure and trustworthy supply chain that
purchases and delivers necessary equipment to local fire
departments. Currently, fire and EMS departments must compete
with the States to buy supplies on the open market. In
addition, Chinese counterfeits are flooding the United States,
creating confusion.
Fire departments must be a top priority for testing and
vaccines. In March, the U.S. Public Health Service listed first
responders as second-level and third-level priorities. Due to
the shortage of COVID-19 tests, it was difficult to obtain
tests for fire and EMS personnel. Fire departments need to have
access to rapid testing. In addition, Congress should ensure
that fire and EMS personnel are top priorities for distribution
of COVID-19 response.
Fire departments must be notified of drug shortages. The
FDA (Food and Drug Administration) announced that shortages are
possible for medications that can be used for COVID-19.
However, we have not been informed about them. Fire departments
need to know about potential shortages so they can work with
State and local authorities to develop alternatives.
Congress should support local volunteer firefighters.
Volunteer firefighters are providing COVID-19 response to their
communities with little or no compensation. They run the risk
of exposure and endangering their families and being unable to
attend their jobs. The House recognized this problem in the
HEROES Act. This bill would exclude from Federal taxation State
and local property tax and up to $600 and other incentives for
volunteers. We ask the Senate to support this provision.
Congress should repeal the auction of the public safety
spectrum and the T-band. Eleven major metropolitan areas use
the T-band for interoperable voice communications. For example,
New York City, Los Angeles have relied on their T-band
communications to coordinate the 911 law enforcement, fire, and
EMS response to COVID-19. Under statute, the FCC (Federal
Communications Commission) has been directed to auction this
vital spectrum by February 2021. The HEROES Act addressed this
issue by repealing the T-band auction. We ask the Senate to
support this provision.
In closing, I thank you for holding today's hearing on
fire and EMS response to COVID-19. The Nation's fire and EMS
services need heroes in Washington, DC, to help us fight this
unseen enemy. I look forward to working with you to support
local fire and EMS departments. Thank you again.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Ludwig follows:]
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you, Mr. Ludwig.
We now will have Mr. Roy McGhee.
TESTIMONY OF MR. ROY L. ``SANDY'' McGEE, III,
DISTRICT 11 VICE PRESIDENT,
INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF FIRE FIGHTERS
Mr. McGhee. Thank you, Chairwoman Johnson, Ranking Member
Lucas, and distinguished Members of the Committee. My name is
Sandy McGhee, and I'm the District 11 Vice President for the
International Association of Fire Fighters representing more
than 27,000 professional firefighters and emergency medical
personnel in Oklahoma and Texas, who serve as frontline workers
in our Nation's public health response to the COVID-19
pandemic.
As prehospital healthcare providers, firefighters and
emergency medical personnel are often the first workers in
physical contact with COVID-19 patients. The nature of their
work requires they be in close proximity to patients in
uncontrolled environments. Responders performing this dangerous
work must be properly protected both to limit the spread of the
virus itself and to ensure they remain healthy and able to
serve their communities.
Yet in far too many places we are relying on firefighters,
paramedics, and EMTs (emergency medical technicians) to respond
to work without the proper protection. Even today, several
months into the pandemic, fire departments across the country
are reporting a shortage of all types of personal protective
equipment.
In Texas, PPE shortages can be found in communities of all
sizes. According to the Texas State Association of Fire and
Emergency Districts, 2/3 of emergency service districts are
concerned about a lack of PPE and half said an inability to
procure enough PPE has already affected responders. In Dallas,
firefighters are reusing N95 masks many times, a practice which
we know reduces their effectiveness and places firefighters and
the public they serve at risk.
At the same time, fire department budgets have been hit
hard by the current economic crisis, as local governments are
facing decreased tax revenue and other significant fiscal
pressures. This is particularly true in States such as Texas
and Oklahoma, which rely on sales tax revenue to fund the
public services. As a result, many fire departments are facing
deep budget cuts with some already forced to lay off and/or
furlough firefighters. For example, my hometown of Tulsa,
Oklahoma, relies primarily on sales taxes to fund public
services. The economic slowdown at the start of the pandemic
led to a drastic revenue reduction for the city. We are
currently expecting a budget shortfall of over $2.7 million.
Layoffs and furloughs are uniquely challenging as we
continue to deal with the COVID-19 virus. As firefighters
experience high-risk exposures to infected individuals, they
are put in quarantine or isolation, placing further stress on
the department and make maintaining full staffing levels even
that much more important.
AFG and SAFER provide a lifeline to departments facing
such challenges. We are grateful that Congress provided $100
million for AFG through the CARES Act to help local fire
departments obtain needed PPE and related supplies, but we know
that fire departments will continue to have significant unmet
needs in the wake of the recession. We are pleased that the
House included an additional $500 million in AFG and $500
million in SAFER to hire, retain, and rehire firefighters in
the HEROES Act.
In addition to adequate funding, fire departments should
be granted waivers from certain statutory requirements under
AFG and SAFER to allow those departments with budgetary
challenges the flexibility they need to afford necessary
equipment and personnel. For SAFER in particular, departments
should be allowed to use funds to retain or rehire
firefighters. We also believe SAFER grantees should receive
waivers from certain budgetary requirements, including the
period of performance, cost share, maintenance of expenditures,
and funding caps.
We also support waivers of budgetary requirements under
AFG, particularly waivers of the local cost share and
maintenance of expenditure requirements, as well as funding
caps. Together, these waivers will help fire departments save
thousands of firefighter jobs and ensure firefighters receive
the personal protective and decontamination equipment that they
need. Absent these waivers, the restrictions under the programs
will likely dissuade fire departments facing fiscal challenges,
those departments which need funding the most, from even
applying for grants, potentially allowing desperately needed
funds to go to waste.
Finally, I'd like to thank the Committee for the
opportunity to testify today, and I am happy to answer any
questions that you may have. Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. McGhee follows:]
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you, Mr. McGhee.
And our third and final witness is Mr. Steve Hirsch. I now
recognize Mr. Hirsch.
TESTIMONY OF MR. STEVE HIRSCH, CHAIR,
NATIONAL VOLUNTEER FIRE COUNCIL
Mr. Hirsch. Thank you. Chairwoman Johnson, Ranking Member
Lucas, and Members of the Committee, my name is Steve Hirsch.
I'm Training Chief for Sheridan County, Kansas, Volunteer Fire
Department, and I serve as Chairman of the National Volunteer
Fire Council (NVFC). The National Volunteer Fire Council
represents the interests of the Nation's volunteer fire, EMS,
and rescue services. On behalf of the NVFC, I want to thank the
Committee for the opportunity to speak to you about the
challenges that the Nation's fire and emergency service
organizations face related to COVID-19 and the role that the
AFG and SAFER grant programs can play in helping us meet these
challenges.
I'm one of 745,000 volunteer firefighters in the United
States. That represents about 67 percent of the Nation's
firefighters. All and mostly volunteer fire departments account
for 82 percent of the Nation's fire departments and protect 32
percent of the Nation's population. My remarks will focus on
the COVID-19's impact, especially in smaller communities where
volunteers are most common and how the AFG and SAFER grant
programs can help. I could not be prouder of our volunteer
firefighters and EMS providers in being the leader of this
organization that represents them.
The NVFC has been running a survey to assess the impact of
COVID-19 on our volunteer fire and EMS agencies. What we find
is that 62 percent of the respondents overall have reported
that they're running low on personal protective equipment or
PPE, while 23 percent report that they've run out completely.
Forty-six percent report that they have staff who are either
unable or unwilling to respond. Fifty percent report the
inability to recruit new volunteers to be a significant
problem. And 49 percent report that not being able to fundraise
as being a major challenge to their department.
The inability to train, to recruit, and fundraise are
overlapping issues since they typically involve face-to-face
interactions that COVID-19 has curtailed. Our primary concern
of course is keeping our personnel safe. In a 2-month period
from the end of March through the end of May there were 54
documented fire and EMS COVID-19-related fatalities, including
18 who have been identified as volunteers at this point.
Fire and EMS personnel are at a heightened risk of
exposure, and the risk is made worse by the lack of PPE.
Volunteer fire and EMS departments have been forced to reuse
disposable PPE and in many cases to repurpose other items to
serve as makeshift PPE. As has been noted, Congress provided
$100 million in AFG funding in the CARES Act for the purchase
of PPE and related supplies. The CARES Act funding will help
address PPE shortages for the hardest-hit fire departments
across this Nation. While many fire departments will be helped
by this funding, it should be noted that, based upon the number
of anticipated awards, that less than 5 percent of the Nation's
fire departments will be likely to receive an AFG-S (Assistance
to Firefighters Grant--Supplemental) grant.
The reality is that more funding is desperately needed. On
May 15 Congress--the House passed the HEROES Act, which
provided an additional $500 million to AFG for additional PPE
purchases and an additional $500 million for SAFER funding to
help fire departments hire, recruit, and retain volunteer and
career firefighters.
The HEROES Act waived certain statutory requirements
associated with both AFG and SAFER. The NVFC is on record as
supporting the waiving of the local match. Without these
waivers, many fire departments that need help the most would
not be able to accept grants.
The NVFC is opposed, however, to language in the HEROES
Act that would eliminate the law--in the law a requirement the
volunteer fire departments receive at least 25 percent of the
appropriated funding. The set-aside of 25 percent for volunteer
fire departments ensures that volunteer fire departments are
mostly competing for funding against other volunteer agencies.
Changing this, I believe, will hurt volunteer fire departments'
ability to get grant funding.
One of the major challenges that FEMA has faced in
administering the AFG-S funding under CARES was the fact that
they're still in the midst of the fiscal year 2019 grant cycle.
FEMA is now online to do peer-reviews for grants remotely, and
that's greatly sped up the process of getting these grants
reviewed and ultimately awarding them.
The grant application periods are typically open for a
month each, which require departments time to collect the
required data, develop narratives, and put together a
competitive application that has a decent chance of getting
funded. Speeding up the grants schedule without significantly
reducing the complexity of the application will result in fewer
applications being submitted, especially from smaller fire
departments.
Fire and EMS agencies, as you've heard, across the Nation
are suffering from a huge revenue shortfall, a combination of
increasing costs from responding to COVID-19, reduced financial
support from local governments, and an inability to fundraise.
Simply put, we need more money to be able to fulfill our
mission.
During this pandemic, volunteer fire and EMS agencies have
stepped up in amazing ways to help out their communities. I say
amazing but yet that's what volunteers do. They step up to the
plate time and again to protect their communities and their
neighbors when they need it the most.
I'd like to thank the Committee again for the opportunity
to testify, and I look forward to answering any questions that
you might have.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Hirsch follows:]
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much.
At this point we'll begin our first round of questions,
but before we do, I would like to ask that each person keep
their screens on, and I'm going to ask the staff to help us to
determine how to acknowledge the next speakers.
But at this point I'll yield myself 5 minutes for
questions.
The assistance of firefighters, fire prevention, and
safety and SAFER grant programs have helped fire departments
meet training, equipment, and staffing needs for many years. As
you all have indicated, the needs were already great and
growing, and the programs have been chronically underfunded to
meet these needs. And then came COVID-19 and fire and emergency
departments across the country are under unprecedented stress.
Congress did provide $100 million of supplementary funding to
AFG in the CARES Act, but much more, we know, is needed,
whether it comes from the Federal Government or from the States
or local jurisdictions.
What would be the consequences of policymakers failing to
provide emergency funding to fire departments in the coming
months? I will start with any of the witnesses that would like
to begin to respond.
Mr. Hirsch. Well, I can speak for the volunteer fire
service certainly. Many of the volunteer fire departments have
to do fundraising, chicken feeds, pancake feeds, things of that
nature, in order to survive because a lot of them don't get tax
revenue. It's been impossible for them to go out and do those
kind of fundraising activities. A lot of them do door-to-door
solicitations. They can't do those. In those communities that
do rely upon tax support, those revenue streams have also
weakened considerably.
Whether or not we'll see any impact in my own fire
district because we're property tax-supported is probably not
going to happen until next year because most of those funding
sources are already set. That's one.
The other is is that in the volunteer service, again, we
rely upon recruiting volunteers 24/7, 365 because we can never
allow ourselves to get behind in having staffing in our
volunteer agencies. And we've now taken about 2 months out of
this process where it was very difficult for volunteer fire
departments to be able to recruit folks. If we don't have
adequate funding, the system potentially can completely fall
apart.
Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much. Mr. McGhee, let
me ask you something about mental health. The International
Association of Fire Fighters operates a Center of Excellence
for behavioral health treatment and recovery, which offers
treatment to firefighters and emergency medical personnel for
PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder) and other behavioral
health disorders. Unfortunately, mental health for the first
responders is still stigmatized, really for all. The funding
provided under the CARES Act may be used to assist in the cost
for mental health evaluations. Can you expand on how COVID-19
is impacting firefighter and EMT mental health and how AFG
funding can help?
Mr. McGhee. Yes, thank you very much for the question.
Behavioral health issues haven't stopped just because we're in
a pandemic, and in fact they have been somewhat magnified. The
pressure and stress that first responders are under certainly
as they respond to the pandemic lends credibility to that. The
issues that we're having is--are related to social distancing
rules and our ability to travel and go places and seek the
treatment that we need. For instance, at our Center of
Excellence facility in Upper Marlboro, Maryland, the intake of
new patients has slowed simply because of travel restrictions
and the social distancing requirements. And we think that's a
problem.
Consequently, what we're trying to do is find local areas
or treatment facilities in--on a local basis for our members
and firefighters to be able to receive the treatment that they
need. If we don't have adequate funding, those kind of
resources are going to dry up, and we're not going to be able
to find or receive the training that we need or the help that
we need I should say for behavioral health issues that are
magnified by our response to the pandemic. So, we appreciate
the money and the revenue that's available and has been made
available from Congress.
Chairwoman Johnson. Well, thank you very much. I believe
my time has expired. I need some help with that. So, I'm going
to now recognize Mr. Lucas. Mr. Lucas?
Mr. Lucas. I'll turn it to the entire panel for my first
question. In your testimony, you've all made different
recommendations for the best way to distribute emergency
supplemental funds to local fire departments. How do you
recommend Congress balance the speed of getting the funds out
the door with making sure resources are going where they're
needed the most in a fair process?
Mr. Hirsch. Well, I can certainly speak for the volunteer
fire service. The--this grant program--the grant programs have
been administered by the U.S. Fire Administration through FEMA.
They've worked remarkably well the last 18 years since we've
had these programs in place. The reason that they work so well
is that we're--we do peer reviews. In other words, other
firefighters actually sit in on the reviews of those grant
applications, and that has worked amazingly well. We're--you
know, we're sort of the experts in this field, and it's worked
tremendously well. Now that they're able to do peer reviews in
a remote setting, I think those are going to move fairly
quickly.
Mr. Ludwig. And I from the International Association of
Fire Chiefs, we truly support the current--as Steve said, the
current AFG and SAFER programs, the process by--the way that's
been delivered. It's a very clear and transparent process that
there's no middle agency, no middle person. The funds go
directly from the Federal Government directly to fire
departments. There is a very transparent and clear process with
that with the peer-review process that Steve spoke of, and it
has been a proven system that has worked for multiple years, 18
years or so, and we support that process wholeheartedly.
Mr. McGhee. Ranking Member Lucas, I don't have anything to
add other than what my fellow panelists have already said.
Mr. Lucas. Absolutely. And with that, Mr. McGhee, I would
note that it's always nice to have a fellow Oklahoman on the
panel. And, as you're well aware of, whether in the last few
days whether it's Kingfisher County, Alfalfa County, Greer
County, Dewey County, Major County, we've had an ongoing set of
fire challenges out in the countryside.
Mr. McGhee. Yes.
Mr. Lucas. You're well aware of that. And, as you also
know, I represent essentially the northwest half of the great
State of Oklahoma with many small volunteer fire and EMS
departments. And although we've been very fortunate to have,
compared to the rest of the country, a limited number of cases
of COVID-19 in the 3d District of Oklahoma, what have been the
particular challenges for Oklahoma's rural firefighters during
this pandemic? Because we've not faced anything quite like this
in my lifetime.
Mr. McGhee. Sure. Thank you very much for the question.
You're right; we haven't faced anything like this in our
lifetimes, and it has--this pandemic has posed particular
challenges to fire and EMS departments regardless of their
size. What we found so far, as this pandemic has unfolded in
front of us, is the availability of PPE varies from
jurisdiction to jurisdiction. Some fire departments are better
supplied than others. Some have sufficient PPE. Others do not.
And we find that that holds true whether it's in a rural
setting, a volunteer setting, a combination setting, or a
metropolitan fire department.
What goes along with this difficulty in obtaining PPE in
those areas where it is difficult is response protocols. Fire
departments, regardless of size or location, have had to
develop protocols on the fly. That holds true for volunteers,
combination departments, and career departments. We've--
firefighters have done what we've always done. We adapt to the
situation and respond as best we can, given the circumstances.
Some departments are better situated than others, and I think
that comes down to a local leadership or a local jurisdiction
issue, but that's also why funding to allow for the proper
equipment and staffing is so important.
For instance, in Stillwater, firefighters today are not
permitted to wear N95 masks on a daily basis. Rather, they are
mandated to wear surgical masks, which we know has a limited
application. And they also are not afforded the appropriate
number of Tyvek suits. They are only allotted a certain number
per rig. And what we find, Congressman, is these kinds of
situations are all over the map, and it depends on which
particular fire department you're talking about. But those
kinds of situations are not uncommon all across the State.
Mr. Lucas. Mr. Hirsch, if you wouldn't mind following up,
how does that track with what you're seeing in the volunteer
departments nationwide?
Mr. Hirsch. I think very similar. Interestingly enough, of
course, many of our fire departments in the southwest part of
Kansas are working hand-in-hand with departments in northwest
Oklahoma. They cross those lines with some frequency.
Mr. Lucas. Oh, yes.
Mr. Hirsch. Because fires don't seem to know where the
State line is. But, you know, things just as simple I guess
that would come to my mind would be, you know, when rural fire
departments are responding to motor vehicle accidents out on
the roadways, we don't know whether someone's got COVID or not,
so we have to take the proper precautions when we arrive on
those scenes, and that's been a challenge for a lot of
departments, you know, making sure that we have appropriate
PPE. We've been very fortunate to not have, you know, barely
any cases in our particular region, but we can never let our
guard down because the primary thing is to protect our people.
You know, these--with the volunteers--and it doesn't
matter whether you're in Oklahoma or Kansas or Massachusetts or
Alaska, you know, they're leaving their jobs during the
daytime, they're leaving their families at night, and they're
running the risk that they bring it home to their families--the
career people the same--but they're also running the risk that
they may not have a job if they contract this stuff or, worse
yet--and things that we have faced--very small departments, if
you get one or two that contract COVID-19, all of a sudden
you've got a fire department or an ambulance agency that are
completely shut down. That's a big concern and a big fear.
Mr. Lucas. Absolutely, Mr. Hirsch. Absolutely.
With that, Madam Chair, I appreciate the insights of our
witnesses, and I yield back.
Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much, Mr. Lucas.
The Chair now recognizes Ms. Lofgren.
Ms. Lofgren. Thank you very much, Madam Chair and Mr.
Lucas. I think this hearing is very helpful.
I have heard your testimony. All of you spoke about the
need to eliminate the match requirement. I couldn't agree with
you more. That's really a barrier to getting the help to where
it needs to be right now, and so I think your testimony was
excellent and persuasive, and I hope we can get that done as
soon as possible.
I would be remiss if I didn't also thank you for your all
you're doing for our country, each one of you. This is a very
tough time, challenging time for our country, and for first
responders to step up for our community, it's really so
admirable and we are so grateful to you.
I have a question. Here in California we worry not just
about COVID-19, but we're entering the wildfire season. And
we're being told by the National Interagency Fire Center that
it's going to be a very hot, dry weather drought-type condition
across the Western United States. How does the--you know, we're
going to have above-average wildfire potential. What unique
challenges does COVID-19 present in fighting these wildland
urban interface type of fires? Do you--have you thought through
that? Is there advice you can give us on that, any of you, all
of you?
Mr. Ludwig. I can take that question. Yes. In fact, the
IAFC has a COVID-19 task force, and we're looking at a
multitude of issues that impact us with this. But one of the
areas that we brought onto the task force is a member that is
very well-experienced and very much a subject matter expert on
wildland fires because we do have concerns. We have major
concerns about the wildland fire season that's coming up.
As an example, we need to be able to protect firefighters
in those base camps from infection. We've got to worry about
evacuating and sheltering the civilian population while
maintaining social distancing requirements. We have to ensure
that the Federal and local firefighters have enough of the
appropriate PPE and supplies to prevent that infection. There's
also some tactical considerations about transportation and
maintenance of the fire line while also maintaining the social
distancing. And then, as you've heard when we talk about
between Kansas and Oklahoma, the mutual aid between the
jurisdictions that could be hampered as a result of the COVID-
19. So, yes, we have a lot of concerns about the upcoming
wildfire season, and we're trying to look at this and address
this.
Ms. Lofgren. What steps could we take and can Congress
support to provide tools to address those important issues that
you just outlined?
Mr. Ludwig. Well, certainly the funding is something that
is so absolutely important to this because if we don't have the
proper PPE, the things that I just described about the exposure
to infection, evacuating and sheltering the civilian population
while also trying to maintain social distancing requirements,
those are all things that are going to require money. So, the
Federal money is so important to make sure that we keep our
firefighters and civilians safe during the wildland fire
season.
Ms. Lofgren. Just one quick question. I think it was Mr.
McGhee who talked about the need for consistent protocols. That
makes sense to me. Obviously, not every place is the same. But
is this an area where the National Fire Protection Association
(NFPA) should be asked to develop and--some protocols that they
could distribute out to departments around the country?
Mr. McGhee. We have--the IAFF has been utilizing every
resource available as we develop and assist fire departments
developing protocols. The primary governmental agency that
we've been relying on to the best of my understanding is CDC.
Ms. Lofgren. Right.
Mr. McGhee. Our recommendations have been following their
guidelines organizationally and as we assist our local
affiliates with that kind of a question. So, we believe that
utilizing those Federal Government guidelines is very important
to give us a--kind of a universal baseline from which to work
from, and we think those are very important.
Ms. Lofgren. Finally, I was disturbed, Mr. McGhee, to
learn that people who need mental health assistance because of
the trauma that they're encountering, you know, were not able
to--always to get it because of travel restrictions and the
like, and I'm wondering, is there a role to play--obviously,
the center is the gold standard for treatment, but is there a
way to get people in need of treatment into more locally
available resources? What can be done? Because I can just
imagine repeatedly encountering the kinds of things that
firefighters are encountering these days. You know, they need
support.
Mr. McGhee. Yes, they do. And prior to the pandemic, we
were working and still are on ways to make available services
more readily available to firefighters. One of the things that
we have found out is just talking about behavioral health
issues makes and allows a scenario for more affected
individuals to feel safe and comfortable coming forward, but we
haven't been able to fully develop the programs to expand our
footprint so to speak, and it's more important now just based
on the travel restrictions and finding the right clinicians and
the right resources that we can send our folks to, we're
working on that. There are some what I will call groundbreaking
areas of concern there and programs that we're developing, but
they're still in the development stages. They are not ready to
roll out. It's a challenge for us.
Ms. Lofgren. Very good. Madam Chair, I see my time is
expired. I yield back. Thank you so much.
Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you. Mr. Posey.
Mr. Posey. Thank you, Madam Chair, for holding this
hearing, and I appreciate very much the witnesses coming and
sharing with us in more detail about what your needs are.
I wish there had been a standalone bill. I think it would
be unanimous through the House and the Senate as well. I don't
know a single Member of Congress that doesn't appreciate our
firefighters. I've got several of them in my family, so I'm
serious as a heart attack about that.
But, recently, the NASA (National Aeronautics and Space
Administration) Administrator Jim Bridenstine mentioned how his
space centers are working with private companies to help our
Nation respond to the COVID pandemic.
There was one project you mentioned that NASA's Glenn
Research Center helped to develop and test. That product is
AMBUstat, and it helps decontaminate spaces such as ambulances
in under an hour at a fraction of the cost of other systems.
According to NASA, it helped guide the development and
production of this product back in 2015 and is now conducting
additional research to continue to maximize the effect of this
product on COVID-19. Have you all heard of the product, and are
you aware of fire departments using this program to
decontaminate ambulances and their gear?
Mr. McGhee. I have not heard of that product, and I'm not
aware of anybody using it.
Mr. Ludwig. And I--I'm with Sandy on that. I have not
heard of that product, so, sorry, I can't help you there.
Mr. Posey. OK.
Mr. Hirsch. And I would echo that as well.
Mr. Posey. Well, my next question was going to be where,
but you haven't heard of it, so I might suggest that we ask
NASA to kind of reach out with that a little bit. It sounds
like it's really got great redeeming qualities.
In addition to the Supplemental Assistance to Firefighters
Grant, funds provided in the CARES Act, how have the U.S. Fire
Administration and the Federal Emergency Management Agency
assisted fire departments in assessing resources such as
AMBUstat to help them respond to the COVID-19 crisis? Any, all?
Mr. Ludwig. So, I'll answer that. I must tell you that the
United States Fire Administration has been a champion through
all this. The Administrator Keith Bryant has been superb and
his staff has been superb. I spoke about the COVID-19 task
force that the IAFC has. We have a member of the United States
Fire Administration that sits on there and provides us, again,
with subject matter expertise.
Additionally, when we were suffering early on with the
lack of PPE and getting issues through the supply chain, it was
the Administrator Keith Bryant who helped us to bridge that gap
with FEMA, and we had an hour-long phone call actually with the
FEMA Administrator Pete Gaynor about supply chain issues that
we were having, the lack of PPE for fire departments. And so I
can't say enough about the current Fire Administrator and
United States Fire Administration about how responsive they've
been through this.
Mr. Posey. Awesome. Well, thank you. We hear so many
conflicting reports about the Administration, and it's good to
hear that things are connecting the way they should be from
Washington to the homeland.
Mr. Ludwig. Yes, I--again, I can't say enough about the
Administrator and his staff. They're outstanding.
Mr. Posey. Well, thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair. I
yield back.
Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much. Mr. Lipinski.
Mr. Lipinski. Thank you, Chairwoman Johnson, for holding
this hearing. I want to start out by talking about an issue of
coordination. In my district there are a few fire--suburban
fire departments that are coordinating together an Illinois
Mutual Aid Box Alarm System (MABAS), and I supported their
joint application for an AFG COVID-19 supplemental grant so
they can continue their collective regional approaches to
curating and sharing resources, including PPE as needed across
the region.
So, those relationships also allow them to share best
practices on PPE protocols so that if they respond to calls
together in their protocols, they can be confident their
colleagues are taking the same safety precautions. So, I know
that many departments across the Nation work together side by
side in the field even if they don't have a formal partnership.
I'm wondering if any of the witnesses have thoughts to share
about regional standardization of policy for proper use of PPE.
Mr. Ludwig. So, Congressman, I'm from Illinois like you
are, and I'm very familiar with the MABAS alarm system. I'm in
Division 28. And we try to standardize where we can, but we
also use best practices, as recommended by the CDC and also the
World Health Organization. They also have some best practices
also. And so when we try to standardize our approach with PPE
across regions, we try to follow the expert's leads in that
regard.
Mr. Lipinski. Thank you.
Mr. Hirsch. And I think the volunteer fire service has
done much of the same as far as following the guidelines. It's
a little more difficult in volunteer organizations because they
are pretty much standalone and don't have a whole lot of
organization with--other than Illinois where MABAS exists, but
a lot of us don't have that.
Mr. McGhee. I'm not aware of any formal programs in the
area that I serve, but we are certainly open to the idea and
further discussion on that issue.
Mr. Lipinski. All right. One other question I wanted to
ask is, you know, I represent part of Chicago, but I also have
a lot of suburban areas that have a number of smaller fire
departments, fire districts. Do you have any--and, Chief
Ludwig, do you have any suggestions on how these smaller
departments and districts can remain competitive for these
grants? Because that's an issue that they are always asking
about.
Mr. Ludwig. Sure. So, that's an interesting question, and
I thank you for the opportunity to address that. Certainly, the
need to be competitive also is reliant upon the person who's
writing the grant and their way of enumerating the value and
the need of getting the grant. And so one of the things that I
think would help is some type of grant-writing program or some
type of process of which they can be schooled in how to write a
proper grant because it is under a peer-review process by which
our individuals within our own profession review this. So, if
it's not well-written, if it's not well-articulated, if it's
not well-spelled out, that grant, even though it may very well
be needed, may go and be rejected. So, I would recommend some
type of program to help those who are writing those grants.
Mr. Hirsch. That also highlights the need for keeping the
25 percent set-aside for volunteer fire departments, too. You
know, most of these people that are preparing grant
applications, they are people who work in the grocery store and
people who work in the farm implement dealerships and they
don't have a whole lot of time to do this, but they do it out
of love for their neighbors and their communities. And keeping
that set-aside is very important to the volunteer service.
Mr. Lipinski. Very good. Thank you. I yield back.
Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much. Mr. Weber.
Mr. Weber. OK. Thank you, Chairwoman. I appreciate that.
Lots of questions. I know there's been some talk about the
inability to get PPE. Of course, we're dealing with a pandemic
that some of you all talked about earlier we've never seen
anything like this before, and so it was really interesting to
get caught in this predicament.
You've got the Federal Government of course, you've got
the State governments, and then you've got local governments.
One of the lessons I hope we learn, and I'll let our witnesses
weigh in on, is the fact that we need a very, very good
relationship between the Federal Government, between the State
governments, and I would argue the State governments in this
instance more for the protection of their citizens because
they're closer to the cities, closer to the counties, and
closer to, you know, the effects that are happening in their
particular State.
We reached out to the Texas Department of Emergency
Management to see that they had a very, very good supply of a
lot of this equipment. And, unfortunately, I think the smaller
communities weren't able to reach out, and even some of the
medium communities, some of the agencies weren't able to reach
out and deal on a level where they can get enough PPE because
they were probably satisfying some of the larger communities.
But I hope that we all learned a lesson in that we have a
better supply chain or communication chain or process where we
go at least especially from the States to the counties to the
cities.
To the witnesses, are you all seeing that now? Steve,
let's start with you.
Mr. Hirsch. Certainly, the--early on in this, the supply
chain was pretty weak. The folks that we would normally buy
stuff from, those supplies were gone, and then they became
rather expensive. I don't know that it's as major of a problem
out in my part of the country as it has been simply because we
just haven't had the COVID cases in this part of the world.
But, you know, I think going forward one of the things
that's going to be important is at least in my own county,
supplies that we bought 10 to 15 years ago then became outdated
because no one was really watching for it to make sure that
those items were kept up-to-date. And I think that's going to
be important for us going forward is to make sure that--you
know, that we have a turnover of those supplies on a regular
and periodic basis.
Mr. Weber. Right, good point. How about you, Chief Ludwig?
Mr. Ludwig. So, I'll echo what Steve said. And, quite
frankly, there were a lot of issues early on. I talk to Fire
Chiefs who were buying raincoats and ponchos or whatever they
could get because they couldn't--they needed something to
protect their firefighters. And the strategic national
stockpile was depleted early on of PPE.
And one of our concerns and what we saw and what I heard
from a lot was what was coming from the Federal Government into
the States and going into their caches of supplies was being
re-prioritized. Firefighters were not in the priority chain.
Healthcare workers, home healthcare workers, people in the
hospitals were they priority, and I know several Fire Chiefs
had conversations with State officials who outright told them
that you're not the priority. And that was disconcerting
because, quite frankly, when we saw all the wonderful work that
was being done on TV by nurses and doctors in the hospitals,
how those patients got there was through the fire service. So,
we were in contact----
Mr. Weber. Absolutely.
Mr. Ludwig [continuing]. With those patients. And so
somewhere along the line at the State level they re-prioritized
us. I know one particular State the--they received 2.9 million
at that point N95 masks, but a Fire Chief told me with a rather
large department of 16 stations that he received 40 of those
masks, 4-0, and so that was disconcerting. And so somewhere
there's a breakdown when it comes from the Federal Government
to the State.
And if I could just take one more second to say that, you
know, when we--when the Federal Government allocates funding
for highway transportation, there's conditions attached to
that. And I am of the opinion that somewhere in the future if
the Federal Government is going to issue PPE to States, there
should be some type of conditions attached to that, and that is
that firefighters are a priority also.
Mr. Weber. Well, thank you for that. And Sandy, I'm going
to jump over to you.
Mr. McGhee. OK. Thank you for that. I don't have much to
add other than what Gary and Steve have said other than the
IAFF has identified the priority of firefighters as being an
issue and has been working with Congress and Members of
Congress to raise that level of priority. And you're 100
percent correct. That lack of priority in the supply chain
process caused a lot of issues early on. And even there are
still some of those supply chain issues today but not as bad as
they were simply because of a priority. And that's why I think
that it's important, as you said, that we have a better process
identified in the eventuality that this happens again or as we
continue to deal with this pandemic.
Mr. Weber. Well, thank you for that. I'm going to close by
saying it's going to happen again. I think we're expecting it
to come back around for round two in the fall, and thank you
all for what you all do. I hope [audio malfunction] obviously
to the priority level that you need to be and all the first
responders, police included, and especially our hospital
workers, them included, and healthcare workers. And even in
some of the nursing homes and stuff. So, thank you for what you
all do. And I'm hoping that this is all greatly planned out for
perhaps round two coming up in the fall.
And with that, Madam Chair, I'm going to yield back.
Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much, Mr. Weber.
Ms. Bonamici is recognized.
Ms. Bonamici. Thank you so much, Chairwoman Johnson and
Ranking Member Lucas, and thank you to our witnesses.
We know that the funding from the CARES Act was so
desperately needed but certainly not enough. Here in Oregon
we're worried about understaffed fire departments and
firefighters dangerously exposed because of a lack of PPE. I'm
glad we're talking about this issue. My State is already
operating, according to the Oregon State Firefighters Council,
about 1,200 firefighters below recommended staffing levels. And
here in northwest Oregon our Tualatin Valley Fire and Rescue
has already paid close to $1 million for PPE and sanitation
supplies. They've applied for a supplemental AFG grant under
CARES, but even if they receive the full amount, it won't even
cover half of that.
Chief Deric Weiss told us that they're preparing for a
possible resurgence in the fall. It's extremely difficult when
they're still trying to figure out how to cover the expenses
that they've already incurred.
I want to start by saying I share Ms. Lofgren's comments
and concerns about the match requirement, but, Mr. McGhee, even
as supply chains start to normalize, are you concerned that
departments might not be able to purchase adequate PPE because
of a limited funding, and do they have access to some best
practices regarding how to distribute supplies of PPE when we
have unpredictable need over an uncertain period of time?
Mr. McGhee. Certainly. The supply chain, the availability,
and the cost of PPE is important, especially for these
locations that we're talking about that are already cash-
strapped. And this reality that we're living in where personal
protective equipment and the costs have been marked up is just
unacceptable, and we would hope that those issues are able to
be addressed as we move forward into the--into our ability to
respond.
Ms. Bonamici. We all certainly hope that, and I know here
in Oregon, as well as many places, there are some really strong
price-gouging provisions that can be enforced, but we need to
make sure that all our firefighters have access to PPE, as well
as all of those frontline workers. It's so important.
I want to just follow up a little bit on the conversation
that we were just having in response to Mr. Weber's comments
about how firefighters and emergency medical personnel are
really the prehospital healthcare providers and often the first
workers in physical contact with infected individuals. And we
know COVID-19 is disproportionately affecting African-
Americans, Latinx community, people with underlying health
conditions, and also people over the age of 65, so I'm going to
start, again, with Mr. McGhee but then ask the others as well,
what is being done to help make sure that emergency care needs
of these communities are met? And does funding through the fire
grants program help to meet these specific needs and urgent
care required of these high-risk communities?
Mr. McGhee. Certainly. Certainly, AFG and grant money, as
it applies toward the purchase of PPE, would be utilized in
those communities as well, in every community. So, the level of
response and the type of response dictates the level and type
of PPE that is required, so information coming from our
dispatchers as we're responding to potential COVID patients in
high-risk areas is invaluable information for us to have.
That's why it's important for fire departments and governmental
agencies to work together so that we can share that information
and the responders that are going into those situations know
what they're getting into so that they can then wear the proper
level of protection. That's the most important thing is
information so that we know how to prepare.
Ms. Bonamici. That's great. And, Chief Ludwig or Mr.
Hirsch, do you want to talk about the importance of this grant
funding to meeting the needs of those particularly vulnerable
communities?
Mr. Hirsch. Well, I'll just add that what's so imperative
is the SAFER funding. As I like to say, there's no 912 on the
phone dial. After you dial 911, if no one shows up, there's no
one else to call. So, it's so important that we have people in
our communities able to respond to those that are in need,
those that are disadvantaged, those who are at high risk. As we
projected, we're looking at the potential of 30,000
firefighters being laid off over the next year. SAFER funding
would help that. We're not asking for additional firefighters.
We're just asking to retain those that we currently have
through that SAFER funding.
SAFER would also help volunteer fire departments in the
fact that they could use that for recruiting and retaining
firefighters. So, it's so important that the SAFER funding be
there to respond to those that are in need and those that are
disadvantaged, as you asked.
Ms. Bonamici. Well, and I know, Mr. Hirsch, in your
testimony, you talked about the issues of recruiting and how
that's really challenging because of the physical distancing
and restrictions on gatherings, so how is recruiting going?
Mr. Hirsch. Well, you know, we have got significant
problems in the number of volunteers all across the Nation,
anecdotally and statistically speaking. This certainly isn't
going to help that. We've seen a decline in the number of
volunteers over the past 20 to 30 years, and this is going to--
we've taken 2 months out of the process here of being able to
recruit people.
But I will tell you, too, that fire departments are--
they're amazing bunches of people who will make do. They'll
take the lemons and they'll make lemonade out of it. We
recruited people during the pandemic. We were doing--in my
little rural fire department in very rural, remote Kansas, we
were doing Zoom meetings every week in lieu of doing in-person
meetings, and we actually recruited people in that fashion.
There's ways to do it, but certainly we have to--recruiting is
one of those 24/7, 365. You ever get behind the curve in the
volunteer service, it's all over because we--you always have
people coming and going, and you've got to keep them coming in
the front door all the time.
Ms. Bonamici. [audio malfunction] and I have rural
firefighters here in northwest Oregon----
Mr. Hirsch. Sure.
Ms. Bonamici [continuing]. And I really appreciate the
need to recruit and make sure that we can keep all of our
communities safe. Thank you for all the work you do. I yield
back, Madam Chair. Thank you.
Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much. Mr. Babin.
Mr. Babin. OK. Thank you, Madam Chair.
And I just want to say thank you to all three of our
witnesses for being here with us today, and a special thanks to
our first responders, in this case, our firefighters. I have a
tremendous amount of respect for the work that these men and
women do every single day to keep us safe.
And as a Representative of southeast Texas, I am too
familiar with the dire circumstances that many firefighters
find themselves working in during hurricane season, and that is
storm rescue and recovery. My district from the eastern suburbs
to the Louisiana State line continues to be hit by 200-year
floods and record rainfall. I have a number of volunteer fire
departments, one of which is Pasadena, Texas, of which is
probably one of the largest if not the largest single
municipality volunteer fire department in the country.
But when these hurricanes hit, firefighters and first
responders are always there no matter the condition. We're
entering into yet another hurricane season. One tropical storm
just came through last week in Louisiana. They've got to have
the resources they need to respond to these disasters if they
do happen. And it's not a matter of if; it's a matter of when.
And so my question to all three of our witnesses here
today is simply this. What is needed to better prepare our
firefighters for hurricane season, and what does the current
resource cache look like for disaster preparedness across the
country and specifically in our State of Texas? Thank you.
Mr. Ludwig. I'll----
Mr. Babin. Yes, sir, go ahead.
Mr. Ludwig. I'll go ahead and tackle that as best I can. I
don't know specifically how your cache of supplies looks like
in Texas, but I do know that one of the most valuable resources
that the fire service has during the hurricane is our USAR
(urban search and rescue) teams, the Urban Search and Rescue
teams. There's 28 of those teams that are federally funded
around the country. I don't know the number that's in Texas,
but it just wouldn't be Texas where they would pull those teams
from. They would pull them from Memphis. When I worked in
Memphis, Memphis has one of those Federal teams. They have
teams in California, Arizona, Florida. I know that the team in
Memphis was pulled down during Hurricane Katrina and some of
the other like Wilma and Rita.
So, it's so important federally--it's so important that
federally those teams are supported not only financially but
also administratively, and so--because those additional
resources are truly needed during a hurricane or some other
cataclysmic event like that.
Mr. Hirsch. But I don't know that I can necessarily
address hurricanes either being a flatlander out here in the
middle of Kansas, but certainly the same types of thoughts go
through my mind and went through my mind when we first started
into this because we're in Tornado Alley. And it--while it's
certainly not necessarily to the degree of a hurricane, it is
something that we sit down and plan for as well, how do we
handle those type of natural disasters in the event that we're
still in the middle of COVID-19 response? It's a difficult
thing to plan for.
Mr. McGhee. I'm a little familiar with the hurricane
response in Texas. I've responded and been there in the State
for every hurricane that's been--come across Texas since 2004 I
believe. One of the biggest issues in relation to hurricane
response and disaster preparedness certainly is equipment and
people. Those are the two biggest things that we need.
Organizationally, the IAFF has a disaster relief program where
we can assist firefighters and others as they come out from
under the storm response, but one of the issues that we've
found is communication with existing State agencies, we're an
organization that has resources that are available, and the
State has resources that are available, and coordinating that
is a bit of a challenge. So, I see that as something that
really needs to--that we need to work on as we coordinate all
of our relief efforts during these kinds of storms.
Mr. Babin. OK. Well, those are all great answers, and I
want to say just how much I appreciate and how valuable that
our volunteer fire departments and EMS folks are to this
country and especially in my district, so, with that, Madam
Chair, I'll yield back and say thank you very much.
Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much. Mr. Bera.
Mr. Bera. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman, and thank you to
the witnesses for your service to our country and to your
communities.
I know the Chairwoman brought up the issue of mental
health, as well as my colleague from California Ms. Lofgren,
and, you know, one of the approaches we've had in pre-COVID
working with IAFF and IAFC and the local departments was this
bill that we put together, the HEROES Act, Helping Emergency
Responders Overcome, and it really was looking at piloting
programs within stations to create peer support and individuals
within each stationhouse that could proactively reach out to
firefighters and first responders, as well as be a confidential
resource. So it's something that they're entrusted with that
they worked with in creating kind of a train-the-trainer
program in these firehouses that--I'm actually--have my staff
send that bill around to each of the offices, but it is
endorsed by IAFF and IAFC and developed--and it's a good, smart
approach that in a confidential way gives some of these first
responders an ability to reach out and talk about what they're
seeing on the job.
And we really have seen an uptick pre-COVID in the level
of stress with our firefighters, you know, the number of
suicides with firefighters, and it's because we're asking them
to do much more. You know, I see it here in northern California
where, you know, we've now had disastrous forest fires that are
the norm, and you're asking folks to combat those fires, you're
asking folks to continue to work overtime hours and, you know,
again, that does take its toll.
Layer in COVID-19 and, you know, what we're asking our
firefighters to do and our first responders to do and what
they're actually seeing, you know, it's just going to create an
additional level of stress, so anything we can do to address
the hidden epidemic of mental health and stress and suicide
with firefighters, I think it does behoove us to push those
resources out to the departments because at a time when we need
those first responders and firefighters, you know, we can't
have them going down or having them, you know, just having to
deal with this enormous stress.
One of the areas that, you know--and maybe Mr. McGhee,
since we work with IAFF, if you want to talk a little bit
about, you know, some of the hidden stress and strain that your
members are seeing.
Mr. McGhee. Sure. Thank you very much, Representative
Bera. I appreciate your leadership on this issue. It's
important. It's an important point for us getting people to
talk about their internal struggles and stressors and triggers
that make their behavior somewhat out of the norm is a
challenge in and of itself regardless of a pandemic type of
situation.
The IAFF has peer support--a peer-support training program
where we train firefighters to recognize issues about
behavioral health from their peers and their coworkers, and I'm
sad to say but happy to report also that it's our most
productive and most requested type of training because this is
a real issue in the fire service. Just recognizing it and
getting people to talk about it is a huge obstacle, and then
once we talk about it, having these kinds of programs and the
resources available to direct our members to get them the help
they need is really important.
And in light of the COVID pandemic, one of the things that
we have been doing is offering an online peer-to-peer support
program and training program, and that is a result of your
leadership and the issues that we're facing in trying to
address during the pandemic.
Mr. Hirsch. Yes, Congressman, if I may, one of the unique
things about the volunteer fire service of course is that these
are neighbors helping out their neighbors in their worst
possible time, which also means that the folks that we're
responding to their incidents are probably people that were
related to or neighbors to, we go to school with, we've--we're
in Sunday school with them, we teach them in Sunday school, and
that adds an additional layer of stress to the volunteers.
But I also think the volunteer fire service has stepped up
to the plate on this. The 10-33 Foundation, which I believe is
actually headquartered in California, has been--at least in my
State anyway has been very giving of their time and resources,
and they've helped out volunteer firefighters across this
country. And then the National Volunteer Fire Council with our
Share the Load program where volunteers have the ability to
call a toll-free number to reach assistance from fellow first
responders and then referred out to other professionals. And in
fact we just came out--I think--I don't know whether it's even
out yet, a reference book of professionals in the mental health
field across the country so that we can put that in the hands
of Fire Chiefs so that they can provide that support to their
local volunteers, very, very big topic.
Mr. Bera. It's incredibly important. I see I'm out of
time, and, Madam Chairwoman, I will yield back.
Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much, Mr. Bera. Is Mr.
Baird there?
Mr. Baird. Yes. Yes.
Chairwoman Johnson. OK.
Mr. Baird. Thank you, Madam Chair and Ranking Member
Lucas. We appreciate the opportunity to be on this call and
certainly appreciate all that the firefighters and first
responders do. So, I really want to add my support to the
expressions of appreciation in that regard and especially what
you've done during this pandemic.
I guess my question, I live in a predominantly rural area
of west central Indiana, and so my questions deal with the
aspects that impact those rural fire departments. And I guess,
Steve, I might start with you. You mentioned the 25 percent
set-aside for volunteer fire departments. You also mentioned
that in some ways these rural fire departments might be
disadvantaged, so would you care to comment on that?
Mr. Hirsch. Well, sure. Again, the--you know, the
volunteer fire departments, these are the people in your
community. They don't have full-time staff to be able to apply
for grants, and so these are people who are giving even more of
their time, not just responding to calls but now raising money.
And I guess it's not just those people who are doing grants. In
many fire departments those are the people who are doing the
bake sales, who are doing the pancake feeds, week in and week
out, in order for those departments to even have money to be
able to respond on a regular basis, let alone to have to
respond to COVID-19 calls, very unique. That's why maintaining
that 25 percent set-aside for volunteer fire agencies are very
important.
Mr. Baird. I might add that some of those pancakes aren't
really bad either. I mean, they do a pretty good job.
Mr. Hirsch. That is correct.
Mr. Baird. I'm vulnerable to that. Anyway, Gary, would you
mind commenting? You mentioned something I think in your
testimony about not having access or having shortages of some
of the medical medications. Could you clarify that so I make
sure I understand what you were talking to or making reference
to there?
Mr. Ludwig. Yes. Yes, Congressman. There are certain drugs
that we require that we use, and we use those in advanced life
support procedures. And, quite frankly, this drug shortage has
gone on for at least 10 to 12 years that I know of. You might
have the FDA that stops a line based on some type of quality
issue. You might have a drug company that decides that they're
not making a profit on this type of drug, so they'll switch
their line to another type of drugs. And so we've seen this
drug shortage for an extended period of time.
And then when the COVID-19 hit, it really exacerbated the
problem quite frankly, and so critical drugs that we need for
the--for instance, the--as we sedate patients because that--
those drugs were also needed for the ventilators that were
being used in the hospital, and we needed that same type of
drug to sedate our patients. But we've seen--experienced drug
shortages for quite a long period of time, including critical
drugs that we need to give patients such as glucose,
epinephrine, and other types of drugs.
Mr. Baird. So, maybe we need to coordinate that with the
PPE to make sure you have access to that and on a regular
basis.
Mr. Ludwig. Yeah, there's--yes, that's correct, and
there's just a multitude of issues that complicate that,
including us not even receiving notice from some of the drug
manufacturers that they're shutting down a particular line and
all of a sudden we have a sudden disruption of that supply
chain, so there needs to be some type of advanced notice of
that.
Mr. Baird. So, Madam Chair, I can't see my clock, but if
I've got another minute, I do have another question or two.
Chairwoman Johnson. You can ask another question.
Mr. Baird. Thank you. So, Sandy, on the protective PPE
equipment and so on, are there additional things that you think
we need to help protect firefighters? I mean, we've already
discussed how many times they're the first ones there and
interact in close proximity to some of these people you go take
care of, so, Sandy, I'm asking you if you've got any additional
thoughts there of the kind of equipment that maybe we don't
have or if what we are providing is adequate.
Mr. McGhee. I think, Congressman--thank you for the
question and the opportunity to respond. I think the important
thing is the equipment for sure, but I also think that the
experience of the first responders, firefighters, Fire Chiefs
that have already developed some protocols and the experience
that they have obtained during this initial pandemic response
is going to be important as we go forward. All of the money
that is allocated by Congress in AFG and SAFER, to be quite
frank, is appreciated but it's simply not enough. And the type
of equipment that we need, the supplies are short to begin
with, and being able to plan and develop our request and our
needs early on is important, and that's why this funding is so
important. People and equipment are the two most important
things that we have as we try to deal with this response.
So, I'll defer to others that have more expertise in the
type of equipment that we need, but personal protective
equipment is the most important thing.
Mr. Baird. Well, thank you very much. And the clock I see
now shows that I'm out of time. I yield back.
Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much. Mrs. Fletcher?
Mrs. Fletcher. Thank you very much, Chairwoman Johnson,
and thank you to all of our witnesses for being here today and
for your testimony. It's been very helpful, and I join many of
my colleagues--all of my colleagues who have commented about
the importance that fire departments in all of our districts
and our appreciation for your critical work. My own brother-in-
law is a volunteer firefighter here in my district, and I've
seen firsthand the critical role that our firefighters play in
our community.
Of course, I am here in Houston, so we also see the vital
work done by the Houston Fire Department, a rather large
department across my entire district, every day, including just
this morning when we had an explosion in the middle of the
night and our firefighters are on the scene responding to right
now.
So, one of the things that we see here pretty constantly
and I think, Mr. McGhee, you touched on it in your testimony
and, Mr. Ludwig, you just mentioned this as well--is kind of
the critical role that the EMTs are playing in the fire
departments in rendering medical aid and also in transporting
patients with COVID-19. And I think in your testimony, Mr.
McGhee, you mentioned that firefighters and emergency medical
personnel are prehospital healthcare providers, often the first
workers that are in physical contact with infected persons.
And I think, Mr. Ludwig, you mentioned that as well when
we were talking about PPE and how important it is.
So, following up on my colleagues' questions on that
issue, I would be interested if you could just share with us a
little bit more about that role and how that is affecting your
department as well, just--of course, we all anticipate the--
responding to the fires, but what I think I read in your
testimony, Mr. McGhee, was that the National Fire Protection
Association reported that 64 percent of fire department
responses in 2018 were actually medical calls.
So, can you talk a little bit about the breakdown of 9-1-1
emergency medical responses? Has that changed during the COVID-
19 pandemic? Are you seeing more, are you seeing less? And then
what are you doing or what do you think you should--you need
more help to be able to do to protect your firefighters and
EMTs from the virus, whether it's additional trainings, other
things? I'd love to hear from everyone on kind of that role
with the time that I have left, which is about 3 minutes.
Mr. McGhee. Thank you for the question. I'm not aware that
the response percentages have changed since the pandemic, but
I'm also not--I haven't viewed any of the latest reports, so I
don't really know. And as I believe the Chief said earlier, you
know, fires and other types of calls that firefighters respond
to haven't stopped simply because we're in a pandemic--and I
shouldn't say simply--because of the pandemic. So, the
percentages I'm not sure have changed. It wouldn't surprise me
if it's a little more elevated as far as EMS response goes.
What we found in Houston is not--I don't want to bring up
a sore subject, but what we found is a battle between our
firefighters and the city of Houston in relation to PPE. Our
leadership for Houston firefighters has had to go to great
lengths to identify for the city administration their own
ability to utilize funds that have been allocated for the city
of Houston from the Federal Government and to buy the proper
equipment. We're talking about a lack of gloves, face shields,
body isolation suits, the Tyvek suits that I was referring to.
And for a city of four million people, that's a real problem.
And so what we would like to see is the availability of
the revenue without the waivers for AFG to make it easier even
for a city like Houston with their vast resources to be able to
purchase the appropriate equipment for firefighters and
responders.
And the other part that I'd like to leave you with is our
firefighters actually partnered with the Department of Health
in Houston to check on the well-being of nursing home patients,
and they did that on a voluntary basis. And they did that also
knowing that they might not have the appropriate level of PPE.
So, we're all in. We're ready to respond to our
constituency so to speak. And having that AFG funding without
the waivers is going to help us do that.
Mrs. Fletcher. That's helpful. Thank you.
Mr. Ludwig, would you like to weigh in?
Mr. Ludwig. I'll kind of echo what Sandy said. And the
waivers are so important that they need--they need to be
waived. In my own community here in Champaign, Illinois, we've
lost significant revenue with sales tax money. We're the home
of the University of Illinois, and when you send 55,000
students home and they stop buying the pizzas and all the other
things that college students do, we have a lack of sales,
money, revenue coming in here, sales tax money revenue coming
in. So, I don't have the extra abundance of money in my budget
to go ahead and pay for those matches, so it's so important
that that be waived. And, again, we recommend wholeheartedly
that be done through a direct program from the Federal
Government directly to the fire departments.
Mrs. Fletcher. Thank you so much for that. I know that
these are important priorities, and we were talking about the
HEROES Act, how we can help, how we can get direct funding, how
we can address a lot of these issues, and so I'm optimistic
that your testimony here today will be very helpful in us being
able to move that forward.
I see I have used up all of my time, so I thank you very
much for your participation and your comments here today. And,
Madam Chairwoman, I yield back.
Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much. Mr. Balderson.
Mr. Balderson. Thank you, Chairwoman Johnson, and thank
you for holding this hearing today. And thank all our panelists
here, and thank you very much, as everyone said, for your
service. I'm very grateful for everything that you all do.
My first question is for Mr. Hirsch. You mentioned that
you have concerns with legislative solutions that disadvantage
rural and volunteer fire departments. I have heard from
volunteer departments throughout this crisis and know that they
face unique challenges. Could you elaborate on what Congress
could do legislatively that would help these departments to the
same extent that it helps all other types of fire departments?
Mr. Hirsch. Sure. You know, when the FIRE Act grant
program was first started, there was a considerable larger pool
of money that was put into those programs, and what you see is
when the pie gets smaller, it gets a lot--the pieces get a lot
smaller for people. And that's part of what's happening at the
volunteer fire service is that, as the pie got smaller and the
pieces got smaller, some departments just flat gave up applying
because they would try a year or 2 or 3 years in a row and be
turned down, and then they finally decided it's a waste of
their time to do that.
Chairwoman Johnson. Mr. Balderson, can you turn your
camera on?
Mr. Hirsch. I'm sorry.
Chairwoman Johnson. OK. We see you.
Mr. Hirsch. OK. So, you know, when you take the pie and
you make it smaller and then you cut the pieces even smaller,
it makes it very difficult for volunteer fire departments, and
that's why it's so important to keep that 25 percent set-aside.
You know, I would add, too, that one of the unique
challenges--and I--and I've mentioned this before of volunteer
especially EMS agencies I think even more so than our fire
agencies, you know, I've got a county that you have got 10 or
12 people who are volunteering their time to protect the health
of their community. It takes only one or two of those to
contract COVID and the entire agency is shut down. They're
covering 900 square miles as it is. How are you going to be
able to provide EMS service in that community to those people?
That's why it's so important to protect the health of our
personnel.
Mr. Balderson. OK. Thank you very much.
Mr. Hirsch, I'll have you do a follow-up here. And one
issue that has struck out to me is that various types of
departments are handling widely different challenges. Given the
expertise we have testifying today, could each of you, and,
like I said, I'll start with you, Mr. Hirsch, tell us what you
feel the biggest challenge is for your respective organizations
and how we can work together to find a solution that supports
all types of fire departments? Thank you.
Mr. Hirsch. Our biggest challenge is financing, and, as I
mentioned in my testimony, that--we've got to put more money in
this program because that's the only solution. And we've got--
departments have to know there will be departments in your
State that will survive entirely upon fundraisers and they're
unable to do that. And that's going to have the spinoff
effects. It's not just the response to COVID but now they can
no longer have the money in the bank to be able to provide
equipment for responding to structure fires. They can no longer
upgrade the fire truck that they need to upgrade, and then
they're making choices about whether or not to pay utility
bills or insurance. This is a big issue. And the only way that
that's going to be handled is with proper financing.
Mr. Balderson. Chief Ludwig, would you like to follow up?
Mr. Ludwig. Yes, I pretty much echo what Steve just said,
but I just want to add that financing is so important. My own
budget has been decimated with overtime. It's been decimated
with the supplies we had to buy. I talk to Fire Chiefs all over
the Nation all the time. I talked to a Chief yesterday in New
England, and he told me he's already cut his budget 10 percent,
but in order to cut his budget 10 percent had to do another 10
percent coming. I've talked to Fire Chiefs who were told to cut
5, 10, 15, even 20 percent of their budget because, one, we've
expended our overtime budgets. I've expended my overtime
budget. And now we have an economic downturn which shut down
the economy where municipal governments rely and fire districts
rely on that revenue coming in from taxes, and that's been
gone. And so--and again, that is the biggest component that I
might add, and I would just simply stand by what I said with
the financing issues.
Mr. Balderson. All right. Thank you. And, Madam Chair, I
yield back.
Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much. Ms. Stevens.
Ms. Stevens. Thank you, Madam Chair. This is an incredible
hearing, and what an honor to be with Chief Ludwig and Mr.
McGhee and Mr. Hirsch. I have learned so much from all of you
so far.
As you may know, Congresswoman Tlaib and Senator Gary
Peters have taken actions around addressing the waiver
requirements particularly for SAFER grants, and this is
forthcoming legislation in the House through Congresswoman
Tlaib, relief for local firefighters, departments during COVID-
19 act. We are so proud of our fire departments here in
Michigan and the way that they have stepped up in this
pandemic.
I think back to last summer being with my friend Bill
Strubbe, who runs the Plymouth Township Fire Department, Ken
Chapman at the Highland Department for fires, and the
technology, the innovation, that's what we do here on the
Science Committee. And what goes into those trucks and the--you
know, you're doing things so quickly and you need to know where
everything is and it's standards and it's great operations, and
these SAFER grants and the AFG grants frankly are just so
critical for us being able to execute.
And Commerce Township in particular, my colleague Township
Supervisor David Scott with his fire department, we got him a
big SAFER grant, Auburn Hills, big SAFER grant, Rochester
Hills, big SAFER grant, but let's just talk about--and, Mr.
McGhee, maybe you could kick us off. Can you just discuss for
me the importance of ensuring that our fire departments are
adequately staffed and the role that SAFER grants have in
ensuring that with the safety and what this waiver
requirement--you know, do you think it is necessary, and if so,
why or why not?
Because, you know, what we want to get at is we did this
in HEROES. We did a part of it. We've got forthcoming
legislation, and we just need to get you guys--we need to get
you the best technology possible. So, we'll start with you, Mr.
McGhee.
Mr. McGhee. Well, thank you very much for that question.
And you're correct that the technology is very important, but
also what's important are people. It takes people to put out
fires. It takes people to do CPR (cardiopulmonary
resuscitation). It takes people to respond to car wrecks and
every other disaster or situation that firefighters respond to,
so people and personnel are really important. And the number of
personnel is important. And----
Ms. Stevens. Which is why I know my firefighters. I live
up the street from one, my home station.
Mr. McGhee. Very good. I'll bet [audio malfunction] all
the time. There are--there is quantifiable evidence that has
been produced by the Federal Government to show the proper
number of personnel or people. The number of firefighters that
it takes to do every job that we have whether it's pulling a
hose, whether it's spraying water, whether it's doing CPR,
whether it's administering drugs, there is a quantifiable
process that we have gone through to show the proper number of
people. And the fact of the matter is, the fewer number of
people that we have, the less work gets done, the less safe the
work is, and the less efficient we are, so the waivers are
important for SAFER so that we can retain firefighters and
rehire firefighters.
And I might be going out on a limb here, but we don't
think that a lot of fire departments are going to be hiring
firefighters in the future simply because of the economy that
we feel like we're going to be in and already are in. So, the
waivers to allow for the retention and rehire of firefighters
that are laid off is the most important thing but also the
equipment that we get from AFG. So, it's not an either/or
situation. It's both of these programs working hand-in-hand for
this kind of a response.
Ms. Stevens. Fabulous. Chief Ludwig, did you want to chime
in at all?
Mr. Ludwig. I'll just say I--again, I echo what Sandy is
saying, and I use the illustration of the three-legged stool.
So, you have the people, you have the equipment, and then you
have the procedures that you do adequately within a reasonable
amount of time, you're going to have success stories there. If
you remove one of those legs, the stool falls over, so it's so
important and so imperative that we have the proper funding for
people, the proper funding for equipment, and the proper
training to do the things that we do, which we take care of the
training. We just need the people and the equipment and we need
the funding for that.
Ms. Stevens. Training, training, training. With that,
Madam Chairwoman, I got to yield back. I'm over time. Sorry,
Mr. Hirsch, but thank you all. This is just a spot-on hearing
for all of us today.
Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much. Mr. Olson.
Mr. Olson. Good afternoon, everybody. Thank you, Chairman
Johnson, and thank you to our three witnesses.
I hail from Texas-22, the suburbs of Houston, Texas,
southwestern suburbs. I'd like to follow up on the line of
questioning from my colleague Brian Babin about hurricane
season. As you all probably know, it started on June 1st, so
just 12 days ago. Not surprisingly with the current situation,
we had two storms develop before June 1st. We had Tropical
Storm Arthur and Tropical Storm Bertha. Arthur formed on May
16. Bertha formed on May 27. We also had Tropical Storm
Cristobal, which hit New Orleans and actually went up all the
way through Wisconsin, the first time a storm has done that
ever and the first time a sea storm happened before June 2nd.
So, my question to all you all is about a Federal program.
It's called the 1033 program. And this is a program that's very
important to local communities, local fire departments, local
first responders. It's a program that allows a local entity
like a city, a fire department, a police department, a first
responder to buy surplus de-armed military vehicles. These
vehicles are worth nothing to DOD (Department of Defense).
They're de-armed. And the only weapons these things can have is
basically someone goes to their local Whataburger, gets a
straw, and has a spit wad. That's all these things can do.
And these things are very important for local communities
to have during hurricanes. For example, Hurricane Harvey hit in
2017 a big town in the district called Pearland, which is about
130,000 people, had three firetrucks get flooded out. They had
to send them out on runs to rescue people. They did that
knowing they'd flood their back, but then all those electronics
are corroded. They are problems of the future.
This program has some controversy, but again, it's very
valuable to our local communities. So, I'd like all of you to
discuss how important the 10-33 program is to have you guys do
your job in times of hurricanes, river floods, disasters,
fires, whatever. And let's start with Mr. McGhee.
Mr. McGhee. Thank you for the question, Congressman. I
have no experience at all with the 10-33 program, and I
wouldn't feel comfortable commenting on it. It sounds like it's
something that we need to learn more about.
Mr. Olson. OK, thank you. Mr. Ludwig, Chief Ludwig.
Mr. Ludwig. Thank you. I have no knowledge of the 1033
program either. I do know that the IAFC has a software program
that we're trying to get States to buy and be a part of that's
called NMAS (National Mutual Aid System), and it deals with
natural--national mutual aid, and so we use Juvare software and
ESRI software, and so we share those resources where resources
can be shared if you don't--if you have a fire truck that's
flooded out, that maybe you can call for firetrucks from
surrounding communities by using this type of software program.
But I have to add I don't know anything about the 1033,
but hopefully the States all come aboard and use our NMAS
system.
Mr. Olson. Mr. Hirsch, third strike?
Mr. Hirsch. Fifty-seven years ago when my father started
the fire district in north-central Kansas, they were very
fortunate to receive a number of pieces of ex-military
equipment, Deuce and a Halfs, 5-tons, military jeeps. Those
served as the backbone for the fire service in those
communities for many years, and they still do to this day. We
have fire departments all across Kansas, all across America
that are using excess military equipment to fight fires.
And personally, for me out here in the plains I've used
those Deuce and a Halfs and 5-tons to get through snowdrifts
because they'll go through snowdrifts when other stuff won't go
through, so very important program.
Mr. Olson. Thank you so much. One final question, this is
also about hurricane season. And as you all know, we've had a
lot of COVID pop up here, 19 in the region mostly in retirement
homes and senior homes. If those people have to evacuate, once
again, they won't be welcome, hey, bring COVID right here, stop
here. So, what are the plans, because you'll be exposed, to
keep your firefighters if they're evacuating these people
protected with more gear, and how can we help make sure that
that's a smooth transition and get them out of harm's way?
Because it's a big deal. They've got to get out of the area for
sure the exposed first responders. They may be exposed, so are
you guys planning for any sort of plans for disasters and
evacuations of populations exposed to COVID-19?
Mr. Ludwig. I'll take that question. I can tell you that I
know that there is a national ambulance company GMR, sometimes
they're known as AMR, they have a FEMA contract where they have
1,800 different agencies, EMS agencies around the country on
contract that if they have to move in ambulances or other types
of transportation vans into a certain area, they have those
sorts of resources and they coordinate that for FEMA.
But even then with those types of resources in place, it's
still imperative and still important that we protect our
people, and so it's so important that the strategic national
stockpile be adequately staffed and stocked, that the supply
chain be good, and that fire departments that are part of that
system, that national system also have the proper equipment and
the funding to buy that equipment.
Mr. Olson. Thank you. I'm about out of time. And, Mr.
McGhee, I won't put you on the spot since you work for Texas
and Oklahoma. How do you come out in the Red River Rivalry, OU
(University of Oklahoma) or Texas?
Mr. McGhee. The University of Tulsa. The University of
Tulsa.
Mr. Olson. Chairwoman, I yield back.
Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much.
Which one is next? I don't have the--I know that Mr.
McNerney and Mr. Foster have been here a long time, but I don't
know--they haven't told me which one. Oh, Ms. Horn. Is Ms.
Horn----
Ms. Horn. Yes, Chairwoman, I'm here.
Chairwoman Johnson. OK. You're recognized.
Ms. Horn. Thank you very much, Madam Chair. And Sandy, it
is great to see you even if it's virtually. I appreciate all
that you're doing as a fellow Oklahoman. And you should know
that Mr. Olson tries to stir up the Red River Rivalry all the
time, and I agree with you as a University of Tulsa graduate,
but still OU beats Texas, you know, any day. But thank you to
all of our witnesses here. This is an incredibly important
subject.
And, Sandy, I want to start with you if I could. I've had
multiple conversations just following up on Ms. Stevens' line
of questioning about the flexibility in the SAFER grant program
and the AFG program. Speaking with many of our fire departments
here in my district that have big departments such as Oklahoma
City and small rural departments across my district and
volunteer departments and know the importance.
And in terms of the flexibility, I know that the proposal
in the HEROES Act gave some flexibility, but the--it strikes me
that one of the core issues in the need for flexibility is the
ability to retain. We know that Oklahoma City relies solely on
sales tax to fund these core services, and in order to avoid
the loss of critical firefighter capacity, can you speak to the
most important waivers in the SAFER grant and the AFG grant
programs?
Mr. McGhee. Yes, thank you Congresswoman, and it is good
to see you even if it is via remote meeting, yes.
The waivers that are most important--well, they're all
important--but that are most important is of the waiver that
would allow for the retention of firefighters because, as we've
already discussed, fire departments and cities are going to
have, if they're not already experiencing, a revenue shortfall.
That means they're going to be looking at their biggest cost,
and that's always people. And, unfortunately, that's the
reality that we find ourselves in. So, the ability to retain or
to rehire firefighters that have already been laid off is very
important.
Also, the cost-share provision or waiver, if we could--
take for instance the city of Tulsa. The city of Tulsa is in a
hiring freeze right now. We've already talked a little bit
about their revenue shortfall. They could apply for a SAFER
grant. They are going to have attrition in their next budget
year that they already know is going to occur, but the grant,
as it's--the rules, as they are currently presented, don't help
them, so they're just not going to apply for that kind of
assistance. If we could get that waiver enacted into law, it
would help cities, and I'm sure there are others around the
State--if not around the State, around the country--that are
similarly situated to Tulsa. Those are important. That's the
flexibility I'm talking about.
Ms. Horn. Yes, and to follow up on that, the--for our
smaller fire departments that have 10 or fewer firefighters in
some cases, the SAFER grants in those cities, could that--is
that making the difference between whether or not a community
could retain a professional fire department or literally making
the difference between whether or not they're continuing to
keep their fire departments going or not?
Mr. McGhee. It could. It actually could. The cost
associated with hiring firefighters and personnel, we all know
that it's expensive, but we've already experienced furloughs in
Pauls Valley, furloughs in McAlester, the possibility of
furloughs and layoffs in Chickasha. And so these are not big
cities. These are small towns, rural communities in our State,
and every department regardless of the size or even if they're
a combo department or a volunteer-only department can all
benefit from a SAFER program. Recruitment, retention of
firefighters, that program, the value of cannot be stressed
enough. So, yes, even small departments in rural communities
benefit from the program, and we always encourage them to
apply.
Ms. Horn. Thank you very much. And I just have a few
seconds left. I wondered if either of our other witnesses would
care to comment. Thank you very much, Sandy.
Mr. Hirsch. I don't think there's anything I would add to
that. I appreciate that support.
Ms. Horn. Thank you very much. I appreciate it, and I know
that I just want to add that mental health, I really appreciate
Mr. Bera's comments. And I'm about out of time, but the mental
health component is something I'd like to follow up on as well
to make sure that we're taking care of our firefighters. And
thank you all.
Madam Chair, I yield back.
Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much. Mr. Sherman.
Mr. Sherman. Thank you. I want to thank the Chair for
putting together this hearing on SAFER and AFG. I had excellent
questions, but my excellent colleagues, particularly those from
California, have asked most of them. Zoe I think had an
excellent point about the urban wildland interface, and of
course that's been affected by global warming, and Ami Bera's
comments about the need to focus on taking care of the
firefighters who are under such stress.
I'd like to take just 1 minute. The--not on firefighting
in particular--and that is the role of the Science Committee
and science in dealing with this COVID crisis. We are the
center of support in Congress for support for scientific
research. Only 1/4 of 1 percent of the money that has been
enacted so far has gone to research on therapeutics,
prophylactics, and understanding the COVID disease. Now, great
work is being done, unprecedented work is being done, but it's
still only 1/4 of 1 percent of the money, and there are a lot
of things we could be doing that we're not researching. And
most of the professional medical researchers are sitting at
home since all of the other non-COVID research has been
deferred.
Also, I serve on the Foreign Affairs Committee just for
the last 24 years. This COVID disaster is going to hit the
Third World, has hit the Third World, and the biggest thing we
can do to help the whole world is through research. So, I'm
hoping that many people listening to me now will support a
letter to leadership urging that we defend in negotiations
and--the $5.5 billion. That's $5.5 billion out of $3 trillion
in the HEROES Act for COVID scientific research. I know I've
spoken to the Chairwoman about this, and I'll be circulating
that.
As to firefighters, our--this is--they're funded as part
of local government in most cases. We're going to see--not only
are the costs higher for the PPE, et cetera, but there's this
huge decline in revenue from sales tax, the commercial property
tax, income tax, and we've got to fight for the money for State
and local government, but we probably won't be successful in
doing enough, and so we have to provide more flexibility for
the funds we do provide.
There are a number of requirements in the grants. One of
those is the 25 percent for volunteer fire departments. I put
that aside. I think there's a lot of support for that. But then
there are the other requirements that in other times I think
are important but may not be good to have now. The first of
these is the matching requirement, and we've heard several
witnesses say that we need to waive that. A second is that
SAFER grants can be used only for new and additional
firefighters, not to retain current staff. Should--how
important is it--you know, that would be waived in the HEROES
Act. How important is it that we waive that during the pandemic
and a year or two after the COVID crisis? I wonder if any of
our witnesses can address that.
Mr. McGhee. I think it's important, Mr. Congressman, that
the--if Congress does indeed adopt the waivers that we're
suggesting or the lack of, however you want to say it, I think
going into the future is important because this is going to
linger around. The effects of the pandemic I think are going to
linger in our economy for a while. I'm not an economist or an
expert, just speaking from practical experience that it will
take a little while to recover. I expect that we will fully
recover. It'll take a little while. So, if the waivers are
granted, as we're suggesting, not just for this current fiscal
year or the HEROES Act but also into the future I think is
going to go a long way to address your concern about how we
deal with this going forward.
Mr. Sherman. And in my prior life I headed the largest
State tax agency, and I'll tell you, the commercial property
tax revenues which so many cities rely upon are going to be
hard-hit for several years. I'm hoping the sales tax and the
income tax rebound, but of course this year is just going to be
a terrible fiscal year for all our State and local governments.
What about the maintenance of effort requirements? There
are a host of those built into the bill but built into these
programs. Do we--should those be suspended or retained in these
two grant programs? Do we have a comment from any of our
witnesses?
Mr. Ludwig. I'm in favor and the IAFC is in favor of
suspending those. That--they should also be waived.
Mr. McGhee. And the IAFF is as well.
Mr. Sherman. OK. And then, finally, there's been a report
that some 64 percent of fire response--fire department
responses were for medical aid back in 2018. Now we have this
COVID crisis, I wonder how that has affected the mix between
firefighting and the EMT services that your departments are
doing.
Mr. Ludwig. I'll just say that, you know, there's a common
saying sometimes that we pump more oxygen than we do water.
There's no doubt that we're mostly EMS agencies that sometimes
go to fire calls, but we need those fire resources in place
because we have to be able to manage that risk.
So, one of the things that I have talked to my colleagues
around the country about, and that is they've actually seen an
increase of cardiac arrest in homes because people who might
have gone to the doctor that have some pre-existing condition,
asthma or heart condition, have waived that. They have not gone
to the doctor. They haven't sought any type of medical type of
consultation or any type of medical treatment, and so they
tried to stick it out at home. And they got to the point where
it actually affected their condition and they went into cardiac
arrest.
Most cardiac arrests--less than 1 percent of all calls for
fire departments are cardiac arrest calls. I've talked to some
of my colleagues around the country, they were running up to 12
percent of the calls were cardiac arrest calls in homes because
people were delaying treatment and responding going to their
doctor, going to their clinic, going to the hospital because of
their fear of going out and being exposed to the COVID-19
disease. So, it really, really impacted our fire departments
and our EMS agencies with the increase of these critical types
of calls, the criticality of these calls.
Mr. Sherman. I believe my time is expired. Thank you,
Madam Chair.
Chairwoman Johnson. Well, thank you very much. Mr.
McNerney.
Mr. McNerney. Thank you, Madam Chair, and I thank the
witnesses. This has been an informative--something I wasn't
really aware of was the importance of the waivers, so it's been
informative on a lot of issues, but thank you for that.
I'm also, like my other California colleagues and I think
the colleagues in the Gulf States, am concerned about FEMA's
ability to respond to natural disasters during the pandemic,
and in order to help or in order to encourage them to prepare,
I co-led a bicameral letter, along with Senator Kamala Harris,
which was signed by 81 of our colleagues, requiring FEMA to
outline their natural disaster preparation and recovery plans
for the COVID-19 pandemic. We still haven't heard back from
them, so I'm getting anxious that they haven't done the right
preparation.
Chief Ludwig, do you believe that the Federal partners
like FEMA and the U.S. Forest Service are doing enough to share
information and best practices in preparation for the wildfire
season?
Mr. Ludwig. Typically, we work through the U.S. Forest
Service and the Bureau of Land Management a lot when it comes
to wildland fire season. Now, FEMA has a role somewhere in
there, and typically, they are very responsive to our needs. I
can't speak for their preparation right now. I don't know where
they're at with things, but I can tell you in the past they are
typically responsive. But most of our interactions are with the
Department of Forestry and the Bureau of Land Management when
it comes to wildland fires.
Mr. McNerney. OK, thank you. Mr. McGhee, you noticed--and
this has been discussed at length really about the shortages of
all types of PPEs. How do these needs vary across the different
departments?
Mr. McGhee. It's--without sounding trite, it's just all
over the map. There are some departments that have an adequate
supply of rubber gloves, but they don't have facemasks. They
might have facemasks, but they don't have gloves or Tyvek
suits. So, it's hard to categorize the type of PPE shortage on
a universal basis if that make sense. It's really a question of
each department and their own needs and what they had prior to
the pandemic and how they've had to utilize their equipment
during the pandemic I think is going to go a long way in
helping them identify what they need for the future. And that's
really all the information that I know so far, but we're
working on how to better answer the question of what our
members actually need.
Mr. McNerney. Would there be a purpose or a need for a
Federal coordinated effort to try and identify local needs or
local shortages?
Mr. McGhee. I think it could be helpful, and we've talked
a little bit about communication and coordination between the
different levels of government, and I think anything that can
be done to facilitate that is a good idea.
Mr. McNerney. Thank you. Mr. Hirsch, you've--and we've
heard from other witnesses the importance of volunteer
firefighters. What are some of the unique risks that volunteer
firefighters face during the pandemic as opposed to
professional firefighters?
Mr. Hirsch. Well, you know, clearly our firefighters
responding from their home or from their businesses and then
taking that back to their businesses, they might be self-
employed, now all of a sudden, you know, their business is shut
down, that's very unique. You know, the fact that we have very
small agencies and the fact that you could have--you contract
COVID within one of those small agencies and all of a sudden
that agency is shut down. And, you know, my mutual aid is 30
miles away. That's not going to work. So, we have to make sure
that we're protecting our personnel day in and day out.
Mr. McNerney. So, do you know if the provisions in the
HEROES Act are--would be helpful if the act is brought into
law?
Mr. Hirsch. Well, it certainly would because it will
allocate more money, it will make the pie bigger, and that will
allow more departments to get funding.
Mr. McNerney. Good. Thank you. Mr. McGhee, how about you?
Do you think the provisions contained in the HEROES Act will
help address the layoffs and the cutbacks problem?
Mr. McGhee. Yes, it will if the waivers are adopted by
Congress. Yes, they certainly will.
Mr. McNerney. Thank you. I'm going to yield back, Ms.--
Madam Chair. Thank you.
Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much. Mr. Tonko.
Mr. Tonko. Can you hear me, Madam Chair?
Chairwoman Johnson. Yes, I can.
Mr. Tonko. All right. Well, thank you for convening this
hearing, and thank you to our experts for providing your
perspectives here. And it's good to hear your thoughts about
the HEROES Act, which we hope the U.S. Senate will take up.
Firefighters are among the most essential pieces of our
local governments. The approximately 30,000 fire departments
across our great country are part of the fabric of our
communities not just because of their admirable willingness to
rescue complete strangers from burning buildings but also
because of the myriad of additional services they provide.
Firefighters, like so many other local government employees,
have been asked to do more with less, their missions expanded
to include emergency medical response and general public
safety. For example, I'm proud that the Albany Fire Department
just this week completed an installation of free life vests
around the capital region to improve water safety this summer.
Chief Ludwig, you allude to this in your testimony, but
could you talk a little bit more about the non-fire-related
responsibilities that local fire departments now take on that
the average American might not know about?
Mr. Ludwig. Yes. Thank you, Congressman. One of the things
that we like to say is that we're an all-hazards response. We
respond to not only fires but EMS calls; we'll respond to
hazardous material events. We respond to high-angle rescue
events, dive accidents, you name the gamut, we are an all-
hazards response type of agency. So, when we use the word fire
department, although the word fire is in there, there are a
bunch of subsets or a bunch of equal distribution of our
responsibilities across the board. And so it's so important
that, again, we maintain the staffing to do that, we maintain
the equipment, and that's why it's so vitally important that
these Federal programs be in place for us financially to help
support those operations.
Mr. Tonko. Thank you. And, Mr. Hirsch, I would love to
hear your perspective as well. How do volunteer fire
departments serve their often rural communities in non-fire-
related ways?
Mr. Hirsch. Well, I don't think there's probably any
difference between the rural volunteer departments and the
career big city departments. We're all handling the same type
of calls. But you now have people who are the volunteers in
that community who are taking their own time away from their
families, away from their jobs, actually spending their own
money to make sure that they can be volunteers for their
neighbors. And that's why the grant programs are so important
to us because it allows us to be able to carry out our mission,
which is, as Gary said, all hazards. It isn't any different in
the volunteer service than it is in the career.
Mr. Tonko. So, it is clear to me that fire departments are
providing services well beyond their original intent, and I
applaud them for doing so. However, we should do more than
applaud, we should fund, and I am proud that my office has
provided 83 letters of support for AFG and SAFER grants with
many more in the pipeline right now. So, Chief Ludwig, I would
love to know from the perspective of Fire Chiefs, can you
describe the process for applying for an AFG grant?
Mr. Ludwig. Sure. So, what happens is the grant
directorate, a part of FEMA, makes the announcement. Well, let
me go back. Congress obviously approves the funding for that,
so that such an--you are our heroes when you do that, quite
frankly. So--but it's so important that, once that funding is
done, the grant directorate announces it. There's a public
announcement. There's a public--there's a period of time where
fire departments then can apply. And there's an application
process online, and fire departments will submit that
application online, including their narrative of why they need
the grant. And then that goes through a computerized system
where--I don't know what the algorithms are to that, but
eventually those that are selected to move forward are peer-
reviewed. And then once they're peer-reviewed, then the awards
are made by the grant directorate.
Mr. Tonko. Thank you. And how about from the firefighters'
perspective, Mr. McGhee? Like the----
Mr. McGhee. Thank you. Thank----
Mr. Tonko [continuing]. Process for applying for the AFG
grant?
Mr. McGhee. Thank you, Congressman. I would--I will defer
to Chief Ludwig as far as the process goes.
Mr. Tonko. OK.
Mr. McGhee. We typically get involved when we have the
ability to work with our fire admin on a local basis to help
them with their grant writing. And we have resources available
also as an organization to help fire departments as they
propose and apply for these grants.
Mr. Tonko. And, Mr. Hirsch, just quickly, the--how does
the grant-writing process differ for a volunteer fire
department?
Mr. Hirsch. It doesn't. It's the same process, the same
application, same types of data. It's just that now you're
dealing with people who are having to give more of their time,
their families' time, and their business time to compile all
those statistics, to write those narratives, and get them
submitted.
Mr. Tonko. Thank you. Again, thank you to our witnesses,
and thank you to our Chair. Madam Chair, great hearing, and
thank you. I yield back.
Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much. Mr. Casten.
Mr. Casten. Thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you
all for everything that you do and for being here today.
Chief Ludwig, we got a lot of upstate Illinois represented
on this Committee, but it's nice to see an Illinoisan who's
here.
Mr. Ludwig. Thank you.
Mr. Casten. I wanted to ask you, if you could, in the PPE
that you've been able to source--and just ballpark; I'm not
looking for super precise--have you predominately been able to
source your PPE via FEMA and what they've been doing? Has it
predominately been from the State? Has it predominately been
from your own sources? Like where have you found are the most
effective channels to secure the PPE that you need?
Mr. Ludwig. Well, early on, quite frankly, the supply
chain was not there. We were putting in requests to the State
agency, which then was to request up to the Federal level, and
the supplies were not coming back, so we were forced to go
outside and look for our own resources. Our mayor has some
contacts with a company, and so we were able to secure some
there. I had some people outreaching to me that they had N95
and gowns. I talked to some of my colleagues around the
country, and they weren't receiving anything. They weren't even
receiving a full box of gloves. They were receiving like five
or six pairs of gloves. So, they didn't have the resources we
might've had to go out and find stuff, so it was really, really
challenging for us early on and really challenging for a lot of
my colleagues around the country to find the proper PPE from
frankly anywhere.
If I might just take also another second, our COVID task
force, our task force at the IAFC, we had an expert on there
who was looking at fake N95s coming out of Southeast Asia, and
at one point we were detecting about 90 percent, quite frankly,
of all of the equipment, N95s that were coming out of Southeast
Asia, China, Malaysia, some other countries like that, were
fake N95s. We actually did webinars on how to spot fake N95
masks.
Mr. Casten. So, you mentioned early on. Is that still the
case? Where are you sourcing from now?
Mr. Ludwig. We're actually in much better shape at this
point. As the curve has flattened and supply chain with the
airlift has become better, and also local companies in the
United States have also begun manufacturing under the Defense
Production Act, that supply chain has become better. So, those
resources are now available at the State level.
Mr. Casten. But are you sourcing--is the State running
that program for you or is FEMA running that program or are you
doing that independently?
Mr. Ludwig. So, how the typically works is we would put a
request in through our county emergency management agency. We
then push the request up to our State emergency management
agency. And if they have that equipment within that national
stockpile within our State, those caches within our State, we
can allocate it from there. If not, they're pushing the request
up to the FEMA at the Federal level.
Mr. Casten. OK. So, the reason I ask the question is on
April 6--we have these periodic briefings from FEMA to all the
Midwestern folks, and on April 6 we were on a call from FEMA
where they told us that they were reprioritizing PPE to where
they were seeing hotspots. I asked FEMA on that call how they
were identifying hotspots because on April 6 we didn't have
enough testing to understand, and I was promised a reply, and I
have yet to receive a reply from FEMA. But I remain concerned
that if FEMA is in fact prioritizing--and we heard from a lot
of local Governors that, you know, States are fighting with
each other, which is not particularly efficient. This is a
little bit of a precise question, but in early April did you
see any significant change in how FEMA was coordinating that
response or was the change that you described subsequent to
that?
Mr. Ludwig. It's ironic you asked me that question because
we did have an hour-long conversation with the Administrator
Pete Gaynor, and those exact words were used. They were
reprioritizing because we were concerned--we heard reports that
they were seizing equipment from fire departments that were
actually ordering supplies directly from a supplier. He denied
that, that that was occurring, but he did state that they were
reprioritizing where they saw the needs at. And so that was a
concern for us because obviously our priority here locally or
in some other community is their priority, and so that was the
problem, and you had much more demand than you had supply.
Mr. Casten. Yes. OK. Well, thank you. And just, you know,
for all on the call, the concern I have is that if we weren't
testing everybody in the country at that point or anybody who
wasn't symptomatic, it's hard to know how FEMA was doing that
prioritization. And the fact that I haven't gotten a response
from FEMA in 2 months still has my spidey sense tingling, so it
sounds like you heard the same thing I did. I'm sorry you had
to go through that. We'll keep punching through, and if our
office can do anything to help with that, let us know. Thank
you, and I yield back.
Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much. Dr. Foster.
Mr. Foster. Well, thank you, Madam Chair, and to our
witnesses.
I'd like to change the subject a little bit to research
and standards. As you all know, the National Fire Protection
Association develops consensus codes and is the standards
development organization for the fire service community. Codes
and standards of care and so on are very important when we're
facing new threats like COVID-19 when many of the health
threats are not obvious. Could you elaborate a little bit first
on your organization's involvement in the standards development
process and the COVID-19-related research and standards
development efforts that have happened and how it's--the whole
system has been working in the crisis so you actually know what
the standard of care and safety should be? Take it in any order
as----
Mr. Hirsch. Well, speaking for the National Volunteer Fire
Council, we've got a number of board members who serve--are
appointed to and serve on the various NFPA Committees, and we
monitor those all the time. It's a very important part of the
process for us.
Mr. Foster. Yes. Well, do you get real-time information
and updates on, you know, what is safe, you know, handling a
COVID-positive patient or suspected COVID-positive patient? You
know, the understanding of what was safe and what wasn't has
evolved very rapidly over the course of this crisis. Do you
see--are you getting a good level of information, or is there
room for some improvement there?
Mr. Hirsch. Well, I'm sure there's always room for
improvement, but I think most of the volunteer fire service is
probably relying upon the guidance from CDC.
Mr. Foster. Yes. Chief Ludwig, any comments?
Mr. Ludwig. I would just echo, yes, we have--we are
stakeholders on many of those consensus-building committees for
standards with the NFPA, and we also work with the EMS office
with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration where
they developed the curriculum for medical care. We're also
stakeholders in that.
The standards that we use what we call is--we protect
ourselves whether it is a COVID patient or whether they have a
blood-borne disease or any type of airborne disease, those
standards are pretty universal. We use universal precautions on
all patients. What we were fearful of was the fear factor of,
you know, how spreadable is this disease? How transmittable is
this disease? Can it hang in the air for another 5 or 6 hours
after we leave the room? So, those were concerns that we had
that early on I don't know if the science or the technology
existed to push that out, so all we could do is rely on our
national standards of medical care and also the CDC
recommendations.
Mr. Foster. OK.
Mr. McGhee. Congressman, I don't have much to say about
research, but the IAFF is working hand-in-hand with FEMA, with
CDC, with Health and Human Services and other governmental
agencies to work through the development of protocols as we've
already talked about, and any research related to the
effectiveness of PPE would be welcome. More research, since we
don't know a lot about the virus itself, is certainly always
welcome, and anything that we can learn about to help reduce
the transmission of the COVID virus and protect firefighters
organizationally and as professional firefighters, we are very
interested in that and very interested in what could be--or
what programs could be developed to help us accomplish that.
Mr. Foster. Yes. No, I just--because obviously the
standard of protection for you guys are--has to be a lot higher
than for the average citizen because you're handling, you know,
potentially, you know, a very dangerous virus. And in trying to
just understand whether the--there is a high--highly responsive
system to make sure that you get the information in a timely
manner.
Now, I guess I'll change subjects a little bit. You know,
I'm very supportive of all the emergency COVID funding for
firefighters and first responders, but really to maintain the
support or, you know, a bigger pie for everyone, then the
allocation has to be seen as fair. And, you know, Chief Ludwig,
you're in a small town in rural--or medium-sized town in rural
Illinois, and--but, you know, often what we're seeing is that
because you're in a large population State, you're--you end up
being punished.
So, for example, Laramie, Wyoming, a similar-sized town,
gets five times more money according to the CARES allocation
that was written in the Senate. And so this sort of thing, I
was just wondering, do you sense that in the, when you're
making grant applications and so on, trying to get the money
that you need, that all of a sudden that you find that being in
a large population State, you're disadvantaged because, you
know, the nature of the grant allocations or the State totals?
Mr. Ludwig. Quite frankly, I'm not aware of how they
allocate that or any type of a process they use on the
distribution of that money. I always thought it was based upon
the need and based upon the practicality of your application
demonstrating that need. I didn't know--and so forgive me for
my lack of knowledge in that, but I didn't know that there was
just a certain amount that was allocated in certain places. So,
if that's the case, I'm not sure if that's a fair process, and
I would add that's probably not a fair process since it should
be based upon need and the demand.
Mr. Foster. Yes. And basically the number of people that--
in your fire protection district, the first approximation.
They--really, the Federal assistance to citizens shouldn't
depend on where they live, and so I think that's a--anyway,
thank you again, Madam Chair, and I yield back.
Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much. Mr. Beyer.
Mr. Beyer. Well, first, I want to thank all of you for
hanging in there to the very end. Chief, they saved the best
for last. E.B., will you mind doing a second round? I'm just
kidding. I'm just kidding. I'm just kidding.
I met with my Fire Chiefs in Arlington, Fairfax, and
Alexandria recently. It was a very good meeting. And,
interestingly, PPE never came up. They said they were actually
in very good shape. I'm not sure whether our State or local
governments planned well, but they did talk about lots more
cardiac incidents, a lot more strokes. As you guys pointed out,
people were just postponing going to the emergency room until
fire and EMS had to come to their home.
They did say the hardest part by far was staffing, people
will get sick, the overtime that was necessary, things like
that.
Sandy, I think I have a specific question for you. The
biggest thing that's been going on in our lives is police
brutality, Black Lives Matter, all this stuff that's come up
with first responders in terms of reaction. And you hear there
are big websites with incident after incident of inappropriate
police behavior. By the way, we know that 95-plus percent of
police are doing a good job, but we're trying to deal with the
other 5 percent.
How come we don't hear this at all about firefighters? You
guys are out there responding, too, to dangerous situations and
people with mental health incidents.
Mr. McGhee. You're 100 percent right. Thank you very much
for the question. And I think it might just be related to how
we're trained. I'm not sure about that. We respond on a daily
basis across the United States with our police counterparts
that usually goes off without a hitch and not a problem, so I
can't really speak to why the fire service is not experiencing
the same issues that the police service is other than to say it
could be related to the type of training that we receive and
the way that we operate on a daily basis. Firefighters work as
a team. We fight fire together, we work on EMS calls together,
we eat together, we train together, we do everything together,
so it only serves in my mind to mean that that's why there's a
difference. But I'm only speaking anecdotally. I have no basis
in fact for my own opinion there.
Mr. Beyer. Well, anecdotally, we need to hold you guys up
for what we can expect the police departments to evolve into,
which we hope.
And I want to thank all of you, too, for the--the
suffering that your 1,000-plus firefighters who have gotten
sick, the 55-plus who have died. That's an awful lot of
suffering, and we really respect that.
Chief, I've visited many of the fire departments in my
area. I woke up at 2:30 three nights ago and there was a big
fire truck pulling down the driveway next to my house. It was
quiet. They didn't turn their sirens on. And I realized later
in the morning that they were responding to a medical
emergency. Why is it--and if 64 percent-plus of the responses
are medical rather than fire, why do we send the big trucks
with the four or five people every time somebody has a--chest
pains or a fainting incident or whatever?
Mr. Ludwig. Well, yeah, you're talking about a deployment
model, and----
Mr. Beyer. Yes.
Mr. Ludwig [continuing]. Quite frankly, one of the aspects
of that is since we all are--we all are all-hazard, we respond
to those medical emergencies, but you never know what you're
going to need. You might need some type of extrication tool off
that if you can't get into the house if no one answers the
door. There's a variety of different things.
So, the other thing is we are strategically deployed. No
matter what the emergency is, whether it's a fire or whether it
is an EMS call of whether it's someone who's trapped in a
collapse of a building, whatever the case may be, we show up
with all the resources that we have because you might need it
because you don't want to wait for another truck to come from a
greater distance. And so that's just a deployment model that is
actually economically efficient so that you don't have to have
multiple trucks serving multiple roles. That one truck serves
multiple roles with multiple people who are all-hazard, who
have multi-response capabilities.
Mr. Beyer. OK, great. Thanks.
Steve, one quick question. Firefighters gave up smoking a
number of years ago, and now COVID-19 obviously is a lower-lung
disease. How has the antismoking, non-smoking culture evolved
within firefighting?
Mr. Hirsch. I don't know that it's evolved any differently
necessarily in the volunteer fire service than it has among the
general population. We know that it's not good for us, and so
we just don't.
But, you know, historically--historically, you know,
career firefighters essentially had to retire when they reached
age 50, and that wasn't any magic number. What it was was we
lacked the equipment available to protect our lungs. You know,
if we cut our hands and we bleed for a little while, it heals
within a week or two. Lungs are not that way. They don't ever
heal, so we have to protect our lungs. And I think, you know,
firefighters are uniquely situated to understand that. Perhaps
that's why we've seen such a good reduction in the use of
tobacco products among firefighters.
Mr. Beyer. Well, thank you very much.
Madam Chair, I yield back. I think it's 9 p.m. in London.
Chairwoman Johnson. Thank you very much. I think that's
our last witness. But before we bring the hearing to a close, I
want to thank our witnesses, excellent witnesses for testifying
before the Committee today. And the record will remain open for
2 weeks for additional statements for the Members or any other
additional questions that the Committee may want to ask the
witnesses.
Our witnesses are now excused, and our meeting is
adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 3 o'clock p.m., the Committee was
adjourned.]
Appendix
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Answers to Post-Hearing Questions
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