Photo by Solomon Crenshaw Jr.
Mountain Brook Fire Department Battalion Chief Adam Bomar talks to the Mountain Brook City Council on June 8 about applying for a federal grant to hire six more firefighters.
The Mountain Brook City Council in June decided to apply for a grant from the Federal Emergency Management Agency that would allow the city to hire six additional firefighters.
Fire Department Battalion Chiefs Adam Bomar and Jonathan King successfully made the case that the city should pursue the SAFER grant, which is an acronym for Staffing Adequately for Fire and Emergency Response.
“We have gotten to a point where the staffing model that Chief Ezekiel created is no longer working for us,” Bomar said, referring to former Mountain Brook Fire Chief Robert “Zeke” Ezekiel, who served for more than 22 years before retiring on March 1, 2016. “When we drop below our minimum risk-level staffing, we are at risk, you all are at risk and our firefighters are at risk.”
Bomar said they are seeking six people. Those six people will allow the fire department to staff both of its rescue ambulances.
“Fiscal year ‘25 was the first time we’ve asked for people since 1995, and we asked for three people,” he said. “What that did was it let us put the second ambulance in service right here at Station No. 1 and staff it with one person.
“What the six people is going to do is allow us to staff both of those ambulances,” Bomar continued. “In turn, that makes those ambulances their own stand-alone entity. Instead of having to rob somebody off of an engine company and bring them to the ambulance, those ambulances will have a paramedic or two paramedics on it already. We don’t have to drop below our minimum level staffing on the engines, and the ambulance can function as its own stand-alone unit.”
With a SAFER grant, the federal government covers 75% of the cost of salaries and benefits for two years and then 35% the third year. Mountain Brook would be responsible for 25% of salaries and benefits each of the first two years and 65% in the third year. Beyond the third year, the city would be responsible for paying for all salaries and benefits.
King explained that the fire department typically tries to hire a firefighter paramedic, who can be put in play immediately.
“We base these numbers off what we’ve typically brought in somebody without experience, so that’s a Grade 21 Step 3,” he said. “For year one, the total cost would be $550,536, and Mountain Brook’s portion would be $137,634. Year two, the total cost would be $578,142 and Mountain Brook’s portion would be $144,536. Year 3 is the flip where we would owe the 65%, and that number is $394,532. The final year we projected, the city would pick up; the total cost is $637,374.”
City Manager Steve Boone said applying for the grant does not obligate the city, so there is still more time to study the option. “I’ve asked for additional information, but we’re OK to go ahead and authorize them to make the application,” Boone said. “We should know in September whether or not it’s awarded.”
