A new Homeland Security grant that is more than double Blankenship Rural Fire District's annual budget means the end of relying on 30-year-old breathing equipment when the volunteer firefighters enter burning buildings.

The $51,000 grant, plus a 5 percent local match, also is going to buy 15 new Generation 2 Wildland Fire Shelters for next fire season, plus a year's worth of training.

"It means a whole lot," training officer Ed Burlingame said of the Assistance to Firefighters Grant.

"We operate on tax revenue of about $22,000 a year and the breathing apparatuses generally run between $4,500 and $4,800 apiece - and we need to have nine" for a full response.

The budget for that $45,000 or so, he said, just would not have materialized any other way.

"We're still using 1979-vintage breathing apparatuses," he added. "They're operational, but they're beyond their [expected] life."

U.S. Sens. Max Baucus and Jon Tester, both Montana Democrats, announced the funding Thursday. It's part of $63,000 coming to two Montana fire districts, with Dixon Volunteer Fire Department to receive $12,350.

The Assistance to Firefighters Grant Program gives fire departments and emergency medical service organizations money for equipment, vehicles, protective gear and training programs.

Since 2001 the Department of Homeland Security's Office of Grants and Training and the U.S. Fire Administration have administered the program. Congress authorized funding through 2010.

Burlingame said the Blankenship department received a $130,000 Federal Emergency Management Agency grant two years ago to replace its 1954-vintage water tender.

Blankenship Fire Chief Ken Beck leads a roster of 14 volunteer firefighters, eight of whom also are trained for the department's medical quick response unit.

They cover an 11-square-mile district from Canyon Creek to the end of the pavement on the North Fork Road north of Columbia Falls, and from the intersection of Blankenship Road to the Blankenship Bridge.

But the volunteers also have an agreement with Flathead County to respond to fires all the way to the Canadian border.

Burlingame said the department is finishing up government paperwork and should open bids from breathing apparatus suppliers at the district's November board meeting. He hopes to have the equipment by mid-December, then get to work on buying the fire shelters. Those run about $355 each, he said.

The $2,000 allocated for firefighter training will go for materials and an instructor's time. Including the local match, total funds add up to $53,600.

"It's a spectacular program because it enables our department to be able to do things that there's no way they could do without this funding," Burlingame said.

Blankenship volunteers have been and would have continued fighting fires with or without the grant, but the funding makes a key difference, he said:

"It translates into doing it safely."

Reporter Nancy Kimball can be reached at 758-4483 or by e-mail at [email protected]