Rich, the county emergency-management official, told the Board of County Commissioners on July 9 that several state grant notices remain delayed and that the county is managing near-term reimbursements from existing grant balances.

“Sheriff seems to wanna add more stuff to my plate,” Rich said, describing added coordination demands, and added that the Emergency Management Performance Grant (EMPG) reimbursements can be paid from leftover funds so the county has funding “through the end of the current federal fiscal year.”

Rich said the state Department of Homeland Security and Emergency Management (DHSEM) issued a May 19 letter describing frozen grants and that the state is still expecting a Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO) for 2025–26 but has not issued it. He said the county will apply, with board permission, for a state National Disaster Mitigation Enterprise grant to help update Chaffee County’s hazard mitigation plan. The grant budget is about $71,000 with a county match of about $15,000 that the manager described as including in‑kind contributions rather than cash.

The county’s integrated preparedness plan is effectively final, Rich said, and will remain a living document listing projects, trainings and exercises for the coming quarter. He told commissioners he has submitted draft memoranda of understanding for shelter use to Buena Vista (BV) and Salida schools, and that those drafts have not yet gone to county legal review. He said the county is coordinating with the American Red Cross on shelter agreements.

On communications, Rich said the county’s emergency operations center (EOC) struggles when more than five or six people connect with phones or laptops: “the system just crashes.” He described testing a commercial cellular booster with 5G capability and said T‑Mobile equipment has produced better connectivity than Verizon or AT&T in his office; he plans to include that capability in next year’s budget proposal.

Rich described recent equipment work: reprogramming the county’s digital trunking radios, improvements to the command-post trailer used at recent events, and ongoing work with local amateur radio operators to support merged communications when state systems fail. He also described an ongoing project to update the county’s radio caches and command-post capabilities.

Training and exercises were another focus. Rich said he has run intermediate Incident Command System courses and other FEMA‑aligned classes with about 22 attendees from county agencies and partners. He described a recent mass‑casualty exercise and an upcoming communications full‑scale test on Aug. 4, plus evacuation and reentry planning sessions scheduled at the BV public safety building.

Commissioners and other attendees raised volunteer and liability questions for search‑and‑rescue (SAR) and other volunteer roles during evacuations. Rich said legal review will be required to determine liability and training needs before volunteers are used for traffic control or similar duties, and he emphasized that “your home is not our priority. Your life is.”

Rich said outreach to homeowners associations (HOAs) is increasing and stressed that part‑time property owners often miss preparedness messages; he has been conducting presentations to HOA meetings and distributing evacuation checklists and Everbridge sign‑up information.

No formal motions or votes were taken on these items. Rich said he will seek acceptance approval from the board only if and when a grant award is offered; the board was asked only for permission to apply for the state mitigation‑planning grant at this stage.

The update covered multiple operational and planning needs—short‑term grant management, communications upgrades, shelter MOUs and volunteer policy—without any immediate, board‑level decisions beyond the manager’s plan to apply for state mitigation planning funds and to seek board acceptance if awarded.