Hillsborough Fire Chief Anthony Parish told the Health, Welfare and Recreation Committee on July 24 that a county accounting error tied to a smoke-detector resolution left his department without $41,066 that had been intended for equipment, imperiling a planned pumper-tanker purchase. Parish said the department discovered a bill from 2023 that the county did not pay from the fund set aside under the smoke-detector resolution and that the money was rolled back into the county’s general fund when receipts were not submitted before the fiscal books closed on June 30.

The issue matters because Parish said the department had identified a pumper-tanker it intended to buy and had been planning to use two years’ worth of the resolution funds and local contributions to cover the cost. Parish said that without the 2023 allocation the department would need to pay more than $80,000 out of pocket to complete the purchase instead of the roughly $40,000 they expected. “It’s extremely important,” Parish said of the $41,000.

Parish said he and his vice president, Brandon Gunn, met with a county staffer identified as Mariana, who initially told them the county would use the 2024 allocation to pay the 2023 bill and would then seek to reallocate the 2023 funds back to the department. Parish said he later was told the county had set a July 1 deadline and that the department no longer had access to the 2023 funds. Parish told the committee the vendor for turnout gear (Simmons Martin) submitted a bill from 2023 that had not been paid and that the vendor’s name had changed since the charge was first received, complicating tracking.

Committee members discussed whether the money could be restored from the general fund. A committee member suggested the apparent accounting error looked like an “honest mistake” and urged staff to correct it; another committee member said they would speak with Mariana about the matter. There was no formal motion or vote recorded on the item at the July 24 meeting.

Parish also described department capacity and program details: he said the Hillsborough roster lists about 25 members, with roughly 10 active firefighters, and that the department has installed about 11 smoke detectors this year under the smoke-detector program. He said the department pays most training costs itself and plans to send four members to a live-burn certification class to expand interior-attack capability.

Committee members asked county staff and committee representatives to follow up with Mariana and with budget staff, and the committee agreed to pursue a conversation to determine whether the 2023 allocation can be restored or reallocated. The committee did not adopt a formal directive at the July meeting, but several members said they would raise the issue with county finance staff promptly.

If the committee or county restores the funds, Parish said the department planned to resume the pumper-tanker purchase effort; if not, he said the department must scale back and either seek a different vehicle or absorb the larger out-of-pocket cost.