The Cheswold Volunteer Fire Company soon will be able to replace obsolete radios and purchase new seating for their fire hall thanks to funding provided through donations and a federal grant.

 

Half of the $101,000 in upgrades will be provided by the U.S Department of Agriculture through a community facilities grant announced Friday by U.S. Rep. John C. Carney Jr., (D-Del.), Bill McGowan, Delaware’s state director for USDA Rural Development, and Jamie Roy, president of the Cheswold Volunteer Fire Company.

 

The remainder of the funding was raised through donations, sales, and rentals of Cheswold’s community hall.

 

Having the new radios will fulfill a major need for the department, noted Cheswold Vice President Tucker Dempsey.

 

“It’s pretty important,” he said. “With these new radios, we’ll be able to communicate with our neighboring fire companies and other organizations we deal with.”

 

One major feature of the new equipment will be the ability to lock in a channel so that fire crews can find one of their companions if they get separated during a fire.

 

“It can get very confusing in a fire situation,” Dempsey said. “We’ve had firefighters get in trouble and this way we’ll be able to find them.”

 

The 23 new radios will cost about $95,000, Dempsey said.

 

The 40-member Cheswold company responds to between 175 and 250 alarms annually, including about a dozen active fires a year. Most recently, they answered a Sunday alarm for a large barn fire close to Leipsic after a Leipsic Volunteer Fire Company engine ran off the road and was unable to make it to the blaze.

 

The USDA grant announced last week also may be used to improve facilities, such as fire halls, because they often are used as community meeting places or shelters in emergencies.

 

“We focus on public buildings like town halls and fire companies to make sure they are what the people need,” McGowan said.

 

Small towns are vital to local economies, and fire companies often are the heart of many rural towns, Carney said.

 

“That’s why this grant is so important, to allow the fire company to have the tools that it needs to serve those individual communities,” he said.

 

Cheswold representatives worked with his office to obtain the grant, Carney said.

 

“I was pleased that my office, the office of the U.S. Representative here in Kent and Sussex counties, was able to work with Cheswold fire company and the Rural Development folks to secure this grant to help Cheswold upgrade their radios and really be able to serve their community better,” said Carney, who is facing a re-election challenge Nov. 4 from Republican Rose Izzo, Green Party candidate Bernard August and Libertarian Scott Gesty. “Delawareans have a tradition of working together to get things done. That’s what happened here.”