Some recently-approved help from New York State may help Binghamton become a safer place: the city of Binghamton has begun the process of receiving over $570,000 in homeland security grants over the last month.

The City Council authorized Mayor Richard A. Bucci to accept two separate grants. One is for $250,000 from the New York State Office of Homeland Security. The other is in the amount of $321,296, and it comes from the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the United States Fire Administration.

The grants were preliminarily awarded earlier this year, but two City Council votes in October and November officially allowed the mayor to accept the money and officially begin the process of getting the city paid.

The FEMA grant also includes around $36,000 in matching funds from the city of Binghamton, City Council documents showed.

According to Eric Denk, the Binghamton city clerk, the grants will likely be used in large part to supplement Binghamton’s fire and police departments.

The FEMA grant will, at least in part, allow the fire department to build a smoke generator in its regionally-renowned training facility, and the Homeland Security grant may allow Binghamton police officers to electronically write and print tickets, as well as instantly transmit the information back to headquarters and the City Hall.

Coordination with county officials is a condition of accepting the smaller of the two grants, a January press release said.

“These funds will allow the City to purchase new public safety equipment and provide advanced training for our first responders,” Bucci said. “We will evaluate the training and resources we have in place to determine how this grant can best complement our existing capabilities to secure and protect this city in an effort to improve our effectiveness in responding to a diverse range of emergency situations.”