FERNANDINA BEACH, Fla. – Fernandina Beach fire and police departments requested grants at the city commission meeting that would help fill critical roles in the city. However, both departments have different reasons for their requests.
On one hand, the city’s fire chief has repeatedly said his department is understaffed, so this grant would help them hire more firefighters.
Meanwhile, the city’s police chief said he’s looking to expand the force to keep up with the area’s growth.
The grant the fire department would be applying for is close to $1 million, while the grant the police would be applying for is a little less than $400,000.
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“If the community is growing, you have to have the people to sustain that,” Fernandina Beach resident Roy Harris Jr. said.
In the city commission meeting, Fire Chief Ty Silcox and Police Chief Jeffery Tambasco spoke about wanting to hire three more employees for each of their departments and use government grants to help offset costs to taxpayers.
But their reasons for wanting to bring on more staff differ.
“We have been understaffed for the nine years that I’ve been the fire chief here,” Silcox said at the meeting.
During the meeting, Silcox said since they are understaffed, it leads their crew to do certain tasks a little slower than a larger crew would. Plus, it leads them to have some workers with a lot of overtime.
He said getting extra staff would help relieve that and could help his team focus on mental health.
“Firefighters are 28% greater suicide rate than the general public. That is due to the things that they see. The things they deal with on a daily basis,” Silcox said.
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Police Chief Jeffery Tambasco said his department only had minimum staffing for their patrol unit 47% of the time last year.
So, he’d use the grant money to fill the need of what Fernandina Beach could become.
“We’re starting to look towards the future,” Tambasco said. “This means taking the force from 37 to 40.”
Tambasco said right now the city’s crime is down, and their response time is below what he expected it to be.
If they do get the grant, it would help reimburse the city for the officers’ salaries for the next few years ― which for a beginner is $51,750.
This grant is only meant to last a few years. News4JAX asked the police chief how his goal would work after the grant was gone.
“We would just build it into our budget, into the city’s budget,” Tambasco said.
News4JAX also spoke with the chief about hiring and if that would be difficult if the grant came through.
Tambasco said it is difficult to hire police officers partly because of the state of the country and also because of getting qualified candidates.
He also said once they apply, it could be a few months before they know they got the grants.
News4JAX was unable to interview Silcox on Thursday.