News

Ohio EMS Organizations Working Well After Split

Ed Richter

01/27/2014

Jan. 26--The separation between the city of Franklin and the Joint Emergency Services District seems to be working out well, according to the chiefs of both entities.

On Jan. 2, 2013, the Franklin Division of Fire expanded its services to include an EMS operation and withdrew from the JEMS district, which had provided emergency medical services for the city of Franklin, Carlisle and Franklin Twp. since 1982.

Since the separation, the chiefs from both entities say the number of calls were within the projections for 2013.

"As we knew, the call volume decreased (without runs into the city of Franklin), " said JEMS Chief Andy Riddiough. "But we met our estimates for 2013."

Riddiough said JEMS responded to 1,501 runs in 2013, which was within its projections. JEMS officials had projected between 1,200 and 1,800 runs in 2013. The city of Franklin accounted for about 60 percent of the EMS runs when it was part of JEMS.

Last May, the remaining area of the JEMS district also approved a continuing, 2.61-mill tax levy that will generate about $700,000 a year, Riddiough said. It was the first time in 17 years that voters in the JEMS district had approved a tax levy for the organization, he said. He said the new revenues would not be received until later this year.

The JEMS tax levy was necessary because 40 percent of its revenues came from the city of Franklin, he said.

Voters in the city of Franklin approved its own continuing 3.5-mill tax levy in August 2012 that generates about $733,000 a year, said Franklin Fire Chief Jonathan Westendorf. As part of its separation from JEMS, the city also received two ambulance units and equipment for its EMS operations. He also said the city purchased an ambulance that was used in demonstrations.

"From where I'm sitting, I couldn't be any happier the way things are going," Westendorf said about the city's first year with its own EMS units.

According to city Fire/EMS records, the city's EMS units responded to 2,089 calls for service. This is in addition to the 787 fire runs that city firefighters responded to in 2013. The city had projected its new EMS unit would respond to 2,000 and 2,250 runs in its first year.

"We're getting there much quicker," Westendorf said. "Our average response time is about three minutes from dispatch to a unit arriving on the scene."

He said the reason for this is that EMS calls go directly to Franklin's police dispatchers instead of being routed through the Warren County Communications Center to dispatch a JEMS unit. Westendorf said the police dispatchers are trained to help a caller with first aid care and CPR instructions over the phone until a city EMS unit arrives.

Westendorf said one benefit of having a fire and EMS organization is that the city is able to pull resources from EMS to fire and vice versa.

After voters approved the city's Fire/EMS tax levy in August 2012, Westendorf said they had to its operation in place by the Jan. 2, 2013 transition date.

He said the idea of Franklin having its own EMS service is something that was 12 years in the making and planning as officials explored the topic.

"We put it together and everyone made it happen," Westendorf said. "It's just been awesome."

Westendorf said the biggest challenge his department to deal with is finding qualified firefighter/paramedics.

"We're pretty selective but we have had people who have left for full-time jobs at other agencies," he said.

Currently, Franklin's Fire/EMS unit has seven full-time employees that also includes Westendorf as well as 24 firefighters. He said add in the EMS personnel, that number goes up to 60. A number of the EMS personnel working part-time for the city also work part-time for JEMS.

Westendorf said last year, the focus was making sure everything worked and this year, the focus will be to make sure training happens and making improvements to continue the integration of the city's Fire/EMS unit.

"Our short-term plan is to continue a good level of service and continue to improve the service as fiscally responsible as we can," he said. "No one outside the fire service will realize what a monumental task this was."

Both chiefs said the relationship between both organizations is pretty good and there have been a couple of times when each of them called the other for mutual aid. Westendorf said Franklin has also requested assistance from other communities for mutual aid in addition to JEMS.

"Everybody has a job to do," Riddiough said. "We'll do the best we can do on either side."

However, Riddiough said he's looking forward to 2014.

He said the JEMS district started out rough in 2013 because of the number of cuts that had to be made because of the split. Some of those cuts include changing the clerk and JEMS chief from full-time to part-time employees, placing an ambulance out of service. The first responder vehicle was cut but was returned to service on Jan. 1, 2014, which also gives the organization an extra person on duty, he said.

Riddiough said the JEMS Board and Franklin City Council have yet to complete the final division of assets because of the split and to try and decide the amount of money each entity will receive. Once that is completed, he said he hopes to restore some of the services that were cut.

"It will take a weight off our shoulders and begin planning for the next five years," Riddiough said. "We'll be able to get out of crisis mode and go to planning mode."

Riddiough said JEMS has stationed an ambulance at the Twin Creek fire station and continues to serve the Hunter area with an ambulance based at the organization's headquarters on East Sixth Street in Franklin. He said that there are 36 people employed by the JEMS district.

"We're continuing to evaluate our services and to expand them further," he said.

Riddiough said the JEMS district hopes to explore returning an ambulance to the Hunter fire station at some point.

"I'm pleased that we were able to work through the split but I'm also disappointed that the split had to occur," Riddiough said. "Overall, the split has worked out well."