Let’s talk about Community EMS District. Community EMS Distict is a tax funded public agency that provides emergency medical services for the Village of Garrettsville, Freedom Township, and Nelson Township. Until October 2009, the Distict contracted with Community Ambulance, Inc. Community Ambulance, Inc. provided the employees that handled the calls for emergency services, paying the day to day bills for the station, medical supplies, etc. A stipend, for lack of better terms, was provided by the district to cover payroll, and capital purchases (ambulances, support vehicles, etc.) were made by the District.
In 2009, the District basically cancelled the contract with Community Ambulance, Inc. The District assumed all assests and liabilities from the private company, and the employees were transitioned over to the District. This now afforded the employees the benefits of being public employees, which changed deductions from Social Security to Ohio Public Empoyees Retirement System. These behind the scenes changes did nothing to change anything the public saw. The taxes remained the same, the station remained the same, the ambulances remained the same, the people remained the same and the exemplary, professional care provided remained the same.
Currently, the EMS District is funded by a 3.5 mil levy, which generates approximately $620,000 per year. Along with the levy, the District collects money through EMS billing. Through the EMS billing, approximately $330,000 is collected. It is important to note that EMS billing represents a collection rate of approximately 41% ($800,000 billed with $330,000 collected). The reason the we only collect 41% of biling has a couple factors. The first factor is that Community EMS District uses a soft billing system. With soft billing, the residents of the District with insurance DO NOT pay balances not covered by their insurance company. That additional cost to the resident is waived. For residents with no insurance, they are only responsible for a $150 fee. Non-residents are charged for any balance not covered by any applicable insurance.
Community EMS District also utilizes as many grants as feasible to assist with offsetting costs.
Community EMS District is fortunate to have many assests. Those assest include our station, three (3) advanced life support (ALS) ambulances, one (1) pick-up truck and one (1) trailered side by side UTV for off road rescues (This cost was covered by a FireHouse Subs grant). The best assest that Community EMS District has is its staff. Community EMS District employs 19 paramedics, 1 advanced EMT, 10 EMTs, and one fiscal officer.
Currently, the EMS Chief is a paramedic who is scheduled Monday through Friday and works mainly as an adminstrative chief. When necessary, he assists the crews in handling calls for service. There are also three paramedics who function as shift captains. The captains handle the day to day operations, primarily running the calls for service and assisting the chief with adminstrative functions. The captains work a 24 hour shift every third day. Working with the captains is the part time staff. The part time staff fills positions that provide 24 hour coverage with the captain. This ensures that there are two (2) people on shift for 24 hours to operate one of the ALS ambulances. There is also a part time position available for part time staff from 8:00 am until 4:00 pm. This provides a third person on each shift. This third person is benefical as they can assist the ambulance crew with lifting patients, providing an extra person for critically ill and injured patients, and can at least take an ALS capable ambulance to a second call and initiate care until additional personnel arrive.
The call volume for Community EMS District has been increasing. Over the last 15 years, calls for service have increased by over 50%. This levy will provide funding to increase full-time staffing which will help ensure the Distict can continue to provide reliable emergency response as the demand continues to grow.
The levy we are asking you, as voters, to pass is not to blindly collect additional funds. It is to help the department grow as your needs for emergency medical care grow. In my letter last week, I explained how close to 15% of our calls for service are concurrent. This means more than one call is happening at the same time. Increasing the staffing will enable the Community EMS District to mitigate more than one call at a time. This decreases response times to your emergency as reliance on mutual aid from neighboring departments will be reduced.
We thank you for your continued support,
Josh Wilde
CEMSD Levy Committee
