House Passed Fire Protection Fees Bill

The House passed House Bill 127 unanimously last week. The bill allows each county to impose fire protection fees by county ordinance, with the proceeds of the fees going to the independent and volunteer fire companies in each county. Our independent and volunteer fire companies are severly underfunded currently.

The bill is out of committe and on the House Ready List.

HOUSE BILL 127 – ALLOWING COUNTIES TO ESTABLISH FIRE PROTECTION FEES	Currrent Status – House Passed 39-0-2. Senate Elections & Government Affairs 4/16/24
House Sponsors – Baumbach, Wilson-Anton, Johnson, Lambert, Osienski // Hilovsky	Senate Sponsors – Huxtable, Townsend, Hansen, Sokola, Walsh // Wilson
House Yes Votes – Baumbach Bolden Bush Carson Chukwuocha Cooke Griffith Harris Heffernan Johnson Lambert Longhurst Lynn Matthews Minor-Brown Moore Morrison Neal Osienski Parker-Selby Phillips Romer Schwartzkopf Williams Wilson-Anton // Collins Dukes Gray Hensley Hilovsky Jones-Giltner, Morris Postles Ramone Short Smith Spiegelman Vanderwende Yearick	Senate Yes Votes –
House No Votes – None	Senate No Votes –
House Absents or Not Voting – Shupe Dorsey Walker	Senate Absent or Not Voting –

Representative Baumbach: “I am very appreciative of the support of chair Rep. Kendra Johnson and vice-chair Rep. Larry Lambert, and especially, the Delaware Volunteer Firefighter’s Association in advocating for our fire-service first responders up and down the state, in helping me to understand how critical and urgent this issue is for our state.

I was initially concerned with how the hearing would go, until I saw the fire officials walking down the hall to the hearing room. “Here comes the calvary” is all I could think of.”