Hazmat Team Asks County for $40,000 Loan to Buy 30-Year-Old Truck

Montgomery County Board Finance & Budget Committee Meeting | July 9, 2026

Article Summary: David Beal of the Hazmat team asked the Montgomery County Board Finance & Budget Committee on Thursday, July 9, 2026, for a $40,000 four-year loan to buy a used 1996 truck with 30,000 miles that would replace both of the team’s trailers. The committee countered by asking the team to find out whether the truck could be had for $10,000 down, with the remaining $30,000 budgeted from Fund 375 in FY2027.

Hazmat Vehicle Key Points:

• Beal presented a request for a $40,000 four-year loan from the county to buy a used 1996 truck with 30,000 miles that would replace both Hazmat trailers.
• The committee discussed the condition and need for the vehicle, dwindling coal funds appropriated for FY2026, and the need for a memorandum of understanding.
• The committee ultimately asked the team to inquire whether the truck could be acquired for a $10,000 down payment with the remaining $30,000 budgeted from Fund 375 in FY2027.
• No motion was made and no vote was taken.

MONTGOMERY COUNTY — The truck is older than some of the people who would drive it. It has 30,000 miles on it. And on Thursday morning, three men from the county’s hazardous materials team came to the Historic Courthouse to ask for $40,000 to buy it.

David Beal of the Hazmat team presented the request to the County Board Finance & Budget Committee on Thursday, July 9, 2026: a four-year loan from the county to purchase a used 1996 truck with 30,000 miles that would replace both Hazmat trailers.

Beal attended with Brian Redman and Walt Tarran, listed on the minutes’ attendance line as members of the Hazmat team.

The committee discussed the condition and need for the vehicle, as well as dwindling coal funds appropriated for FY2026 and the need for a memorandum of understanding, according to the minutes. It ultimately requested the team inquire if the truck could be acquired for a $10,000 down payment with the remaining $30,000 budgeted from Fund 375 in FY2027.

That is a counter-offer, not a rejection — and not an approval either. The committee made no motion, and asked the team to go back and ask a question.

The Case in the Packet

The team’s written request is among the handouts, and it makes an argument the minutes do not.

It describes a response team designated within MABAS Division 56 and equipped, the document states, with roughly $450,000 in equipment provided by the state — including instrumentation the request describes as capable of identifying tens of thousands of liquids and solids in the field.

That equipment currently rides in trailers. The request describes the trailers as the problem: what they cannot carry, what they cannot reach, and what it costs to keep them serviceable. The truck at issue, the document states, has been maintained by the Troy Fire Protection District, and photographs of it are attached.

The document names Jay Reardon in connection with MABAS and Diana Holmes as a former county EMA director. It refers to a capital campaign, to patching kits for chlorine leaks, to an F450 obtained from an ambulance service in the Hillsboro area, and to a truck rollover involving XPO.

This newspaper is not reproducing the request’s account of any of those, because the minutes record none of them and the committee’s discussion of them, if there was one, is not in the record. What the document establishes is that the team came with a written case; what the county’s public record establishes is the number and the answer.

Why the Money Is Tight

The reference to dwindling coal funds appropriated for FY2026 is the committee’s own, and it points at Fund 375 — the county’s coal royalty fund, built from a 2 percent royalty and carrying a balance of $10.8 million.

That fund’s stated departmental scope has been Buildings & Grounds, the sheriff’s office, and EMA/EPA/911. It is also, this month, being asked to carry an $11,955 animal control incinerator, a $16,838 share of a courthouse boiler, a $22,000 municipal oil-and-chip payment, a possible $15,000 economic development contribution, a planned $40,000 request for two portable message signs — and now $30,000 for a hazmat truck.

EMA/EPA/911 Director Dan Hough did not attend the July 9 meeting, and the minutes do not record any county department speaking to the request.

A Memorandum of Understanding

The committee’s other stated concern was the need for a memorandum of understanding. The minutes do not say between whom, covering what, or who would draft it — but the shape of the question is visible in the request itself: a county loan, to a team, for a truck, to carry equipment the state provided.

Who would own the truck at the end of four years is not addressed anywhere in the record.

The committee is a recommending body. No loan has been made, no money has moved, and nothing goes to the full County Board until the team comes back with an answer.