PHOENIX, Arizona (April 28, 2025) – The Arizona Department of Forestry and Fire Management awards nearly $5 million through two separate grants to Arizona fire agencies to support their wildland firefighting operations and programs, the department said in a press release.  

DFFM distributed approximately $4.9 million to fire districts through American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funding given to the State of Arizona from the federal government. Governor Katie Hobbs provided a portion of the ARPA money to DFFM to allow this new grant program to be possible. The ARPA funds help fire districts improve their service to their communities with the purchase of a Type 3 or Type 6 engine, or a tactical water tender.

2024 ARPA Funding Awards: 

• Corona de Tucson Fire District: Type 6 engine
• Copper Canyon Fire and Medical District: Type 6 engine
• Ponderosa Fire District: Type 6 engine
• Rincon Valley Fire District: Type 6 engine
• Mohave Valley Fire District: Type 6 engine
• Tusayan Fire District: Type 6 engine
• Central Arizona Fire and Medical Authority: Tactical water tender
• Superstition Fire and Medical Authority: Type 6 engine
• Eloy Fire District: Type 6 engine
• Fort Mojave Mesa Fire District: Type 6 engine
• Fort Thomas Rural Fire District: Type 6 engine
• Avra Valley Fire District: Type 3 engine
• Tri City Fire District: Type 6 engine
• Buckskin Fire: Type 6 engine
• Arizona Fire and Medical Authority: Tactical water tender

In addition to the ARPA money, DFFM awarded $80,000 in Rural Fire Capacity (RFC) grant funding to fire districts and departments to support their critical training and equipment needs.

Agencies awarded 2024/2025 RFC funding include:

• Portal Fire and Rescue
• Mescal Fire District
• Colorado City Fire Department
• Alpine Fire District
• Concho Fire Department
• Duncan Valley Rural Fire District
• Walker Fire Protection Association
• San Simon Fire District
• Joseph City Fire District
• Crown King Fire District
• Peeples Valley Fire District
• Three Points Fire District
• City of Williams

Fire agencies requested funding support for hand tools, including chainsaws along with fire shelters and other personal protection equipment, and communications tools. DFFM’s RFC program helps smaller agencies with critical purchases that often times their budgets do not allow for. In order to qualify for a RFC grant, eligible fire departments or districts must serve a community with a population of 10,000 or less and 80% of the department’s firefighting personnel must be of volunteer status. Grant recipients must also provide a 50% grant match.

The post AZ Forestry Awards $5M in ARPA Grants to FDs for Engines, Tools, and Training appeared first on Fire Apparatus: Fire trucks, fire engines, emergency vehicles, and firefighting equipment.

Arlington County’s new Fire Station No. 8 is officially in service, celebrated with a grand opening Saturday, April 26, that reflected the inspiring story of the men who created the company in service to its community in the historic Langston Boulevard corridor.

Founded in 1918 as the Halls Hill Volunteer Fire Department in a segregated Black neighborhood, Fire Station 8 remained for decades the only Arlington, Virginia, station staffed exclusively by Black firefighters, even after the firemen became paid members of the Arlington County Fire Department in 1951.

This is the latest Fire Station 8 facility located at or near 4845 Langston Boulevard (formerly Lee Highway).

Saturday’s ceremony (video) took place in the new station’s apparatus bay, with remarks by County Board Chairman Takis Karantonis; Fire Chief David Povlitz; Department of Environmental Services Director Greg Emanuel; former County Board member Libby Garvey; Fire Station 8 Task Force Chair Noah Simon; Delegate Patrick Hope; John M. Langston Citizens Association President Wilma Jones; and Mercedes Clark Baker, daughter of former Fire Captain Alfred W. Clark.

Tributes were paid to the last living member of the first paid Fire Station 8 team, honored guest Hartman Reed; and the last station volunteer firefighter, honored guest Jerome Smith, for their courage and commitment to the Halls Hill community. Also saluted were retired first responders and the families of many others who served at the station over the decades.

A popular notion holds that Arlington’s Fire Station 8 was the first officially Black-run and Black-operated fire station south of the Mason-Dixon line. The Arlington County Fire Department and Fire Station 8 were integrated by early 1963.

Saturday’s event also included an open house and family activities, along with tours of the station and its powerful historical exhibit.

The three-story, award-winning state-of-the-art fire station features a wide four-door apparatus bay, a decontamination zone, and a pharmacy room.

As Arlington’s first fire station to incorporate many of the county’s sustainability goals, it includes an underground stormwater vault, a green vegetated roof, electric vehicle charging infrastructure, and 57 solar panels on the roof to help reduce demands on the local energy grid.

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