The Virginia Department of Emergency Management awards more than $2.6 million in federal funding from the Emergency Management Performance Grant Program. It focuses on funding planning, operations, equipment acquisitions, trainings, exercises, construction and renovation efforts at the local government level. DEM officials say between COVID-19 and climate change local communities need resources for emergency preparedness. Essex, Lancaster, Mathews, Middlesex, Northumberland, Richmond and Westmoreland Counties received funding along with the Town of West Point.