U.S. Sen. Maggie Hassan

NASHUA – First responders voiced concerns revolving around tax revenues, frontline costs and overtime during a discussion with U.S. Sen. Maggie Hassan Wednesday.

Nashua Fire Chief Brian Rhodes joined the call with other safety officials and first responders from around the Granite State and agreed with the need to cover overtime costs as an obvious worry for departments across the board because none of New Hampshire’s communities were ready for the coronavirus disease pandemic. With Gov. Chris Sununu’s stay-at-home order shutting up shop for many businesses, leaving many across the state unemployed, revenues have become a concern, and as those on the frontlines clock OT to respond to the crisis, this will impact their budgets moving forward, officials said.

“It’s been a huge impact on the budget,” Rhodes said.

Like most departments in New Hampshire, Nashua Fire Rescue runs a lean operation at the top, and its boots on the ground, according to Rhodes. Early on in the crisis, Rhodes realized he was in over his head with it just being himself and the assistant chief being the only two working in the daytime. In cooperation with Local 789, NFR formed an incident management team that has been dedicated to the crisis 24/7. Rhodes said that, unfortunately, the department was not prepared.

“We didn’t have the full PPE (personal protective equipment) for this, we didn’t have procedures in place for this, we weren’t doing health screenings and stuff like that,” Rhodes said.

Normally, the Federal Emergency Management Agency will reimburse 75 percent of eligible costs, requiring a state or local match of 25 percent toward disaster expenses. Hassan highlighted how Sununu put in a formal request to have that 25 percent match waived, citing how the entire federal delegation also has put in a letter supporting that request. Hassan said she has been pushing for an answer to the question about whether the 25 percent match will be waived.

“The fact that they did it for New York makes enormous sense to me,” Hassan said. “The fact that they may not do it uniformly is concerning.”

Hassan said the decline in revenues is directly related to COVID-19, because it is the result of public health actions that governor’s and city’s had to take in order to keep people safe, citing how that gap is just getting bigger.

The state received $147 million in additional funding from the CARES Act that was signed into law last month, which included $4.4 million in additional funding to support law enforcement as they respond to COVID-19. Hassan said she is going to continue to battle for more state and local aid. In addition, Hassan said she also will continue to push the administration to use the Defense Production Act authority to ramp up production of PPE.

“This isn’t like bailing out a poorly managed state or locality,” Hassan said. “This is about realizing that in order to save lives you had to give up revenue and that, that delta needs to be filled with federal aid.”

Once on the other side of the pandemic, there is going to be a lot to drill down on in terms of figuring out how to be prepared for an event like this in the future. Hassan said there is a growing interest or move in Congress – bipartisan – to set up some level of commission. This would be similar to the 9/11 Commission to take a look at what happened and where gaps were so that officials can prepare better in the future.

“We know that we also need to continue to really do oversight from Congress’s point of view so that we understand how resources are being not only allocated but used, and make sure they’re being used on the frontlines the way we intend them to,” Hassan said. “And it’s also just a reminder of how important it is for us to come together and plan and prepare so that the next time we will have learned from this experience and can move forward more effectively.”

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