NOFO: Assistance to Firefighters Grant Program (United States)

The AFG Program has awarded approximately $8.7 billion in grant funding to provide critically needed resources that equip and train emergency personnel to recognized standards, enhance operational efficiencies, foster interoperability, and support community resilience. Since FY 2018, the AFG Program has awarded more than 800 fire apparatuses, 150,000 personal protective equipment items, and 126,000 other fire equipment to more than 7,000 unique recipients.

Objectives 

• Provide critically needed resources that equip and train emergency personnel to recognized standards, outfit responders with compliant personal protective equipment to increase responders’ physical protection against hazards during incident response, provide funding to retrofit or modify facilities to protect personnel from known health hazards, acquire emergency response vehicles, design and implement health, wellness and resiliency programs that prepare responders for incident response, enhance operational efficiencies, foster interoperability, and support community resilience.

Priority Areas

• Training evaluated using national or state standards
• Training that brings a department into compliance with recommended NFPA or other national standards
• Instructor-led training that requires student testing to demonstrate academic competence or practical proficiency
• Training that benefits the highest percentage of applicable personnel, such as the hazardous materials training within a fire department or training that will be open to other eligible organizations
• Training that does not result in certification
• Training that is self-directed/validated
• Training that will address an identified risk but not associated with compliance to any standards

Funding Information

• Available Funding for the NOFO: $291,600,000.
• Period of Performance: 24 months.

Eligible Activities

• Some Equipment activities will require an EHP review as well. Such activities include but are not limited to the installation of:
  • Air compressor/fill station/cascade system (fixed) for filling Self-Contained Breathing Apparatus (SCBA);
  • Air quality systems;
  • Fire/smoke/carbon monoxide alarm systems for the facility (life safety);
  • Generators (fixed);
  • Sprinklers;
  • Vehicle exhaust systems (fixed);
  • Washer/dryer/extractor;
  • Fixed communications antennas onto a building;
  • Building renovations such as removal of walls or installation of electrical or water lines;
  • Training/exercises in natural settings such as rope or swift water;
  • LED signs; and
  • Any scope of work that involves ground disturbances.

Ineligible Activities

• The following activities would not require the submission of the FEMA EHP Screening Form:
  • Planning and development of policies or processes;
  • Management, administrative, or personnel actions;
  • Classroom-based training;
  • Acquisition of mobile and portable equipment (not involving installation) on or in a building, and does not require a storage area to be constructed; and
  • Purchase of PPE and/or SCBA.

Eligibility Criteria

• Fire Departments: Fire departments operating in any of the 50 states, as well as fire departments in the District of Columbia, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, the U.S. Virgin Islands, Guam, American Samoa, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico,3 or any federally recognized Indian tribe or tribal organization. A fire department is an agency or organization having a formally recognized arrangement with a state, local, tribal or territorial authority (city, county, parish, fire district, township, town or other governing body) to provide fire suppression to a population within a geographically fixed primary first due response area.
• Nonaffiliated EMS organizations: Nonaffiliated EMS organizations operating in any of the 50 states, as well as the District of Columbia, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, the U.S. Virgin Islands, Guam, American Samoa, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico,3 or any federally recognized Indian tribe or tribal organization. A nonaffiliated EMS organization is an agency or organization that is a public or private nonprofit emergency medical service entity providing medical transport that is not affiliated with a hospital and does not serve a geographic area in which emergency medical services are adequately provided by a fire department. FEMA considers the following as hospitals under the AFG Program:
  • Clinics;
  • Medical centers;
  • Medical colleges or universities;
  • Infirmaries;
  • Surgery centers; and
  • Any other institution, association, or foundation providing medical, surgical or psychiatric care and/or treatment for the sick or injured.
• State Fire Training Academies: A SFTA operates in any of the 50 states, as well as the District of Columbia, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, the U.S. Virgin Islands, Guam, American Samoa, and the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico.3 Applicants must be designated either by legislation or by a governor’s declaration as the sole fire service training agency within a state, territory, or the District of Columbia and recognized by the National Fire Academy. The designated SFTA shall be the only agency, bureau, division or entity within that state, territory, or the District of Columbia, to be an eligible SFTA applicant under the AFG Program.
• Non-federal airport and/or port authority fire or EMS organizations are eligible only if they have a formally recognized arrangement with the local jurisdiction to provide fire suppression or emergency medical services on a first-due basis outside the confines of the airport or port facilities. Airport or port authority fire and EMS organizations whose sole responsibility is suppression of fires or EMS response on the airport grounds or port facilities are not eligible for funding under the AFG Program.

For more information, visit FEMA.