By Mindy Ragan Wood
Staff Writer
Piedmont residents are invited to offer their input as city officials consider a contract with an emergency medical services provider.
During Monday night’s city council meeting, Councilman John Brown called for a public hearing.
“I don’t feel comfortable voting on this as a council without some public input,” he said. “I think we need to have a special meeting for the public to come talk about this, at least to get their input as to what we’re getting ready to do.”
The meeting will be held at 6:30 p.m. Monday, March 11 at the George Fina building. Pafford EMS is the proposed provider for ambulance services that would be housed in the Piedmont Fire Department. The in-town access to EMS services would diminish the current response times by EMSA from as long as 25 to 45 minutes to as little as four to five minutes by Pafford EMS for high priority calls.
Brown decried the substandard response from EMSA.
“It’s unsatisfactory. We’ve had Medi-flight arrive and leave and then the ambulance shows up,” Brown said.
Piedmont Fire Chief Andy Logan told the council that Pafford EMS was the best deal for the city. Previously, Logan suggested the option of hiring EMS staff and purchasing ambulance vehicles or finding a service provider willing to house trucks in Piedmont.
“For years and years, we have looked at the state of our services. You guys have asked us to come up with a plan and we have worked diligently for three years to come up with a plan,” Logan said. “We have met with many EMS services. We’ve worked with our current provider on alternate plans. It really kind of came to the point where we decided the only way we could do it was to do it ourselves. So, we went that route and just about the time we had everything buttoned up, we were approached by a service that hadn’t given us a proposal.”
Logan said the Pafford proposal “far exceeds” others the department has examined. He said the city would “get a lot for our money” with the proposed contract.
The deal comes at a price to the city and to residents, according to a Pafford EMS presentation to the city council. Two options involved Piedmont paying a subsidy and citizens paying a fee on the water bill.
Option one would cost the city $75,000 and residents $7.50 on the water bill. Option two would cost $100,000 and a $6.50 fee for residents. The fee would pay all EMS response costs with no out of pocket expense to citizens.
Emergency medical service providers have increasingly won contracts with cities across the state involving a similar fee and subsidy. In Yukon, Samaritan Ambulance provides services to residents for a $3.65 fee on the water bill and residents were also permitted to opt out of the service.
“Ours is little more because we don’t have the volume (population) that Oklahoma City has,” Logan said.
Councilman Al Gleichman asked Pafford representatives how they would answer people who didn’t believe they needed the service and wouldn’t want to pay for it.
A Pafford spokesman said, “It’s a small price to pay (the fee) for…that one time in 10 years you call for the ambulance. That $6.50 or $7.50 is going to seem like a small amount to save your life or the life of a loved one that’s in your home.”
Pafford is offering training to Piedmont firefighters and will replace their own emergency medical supplies. Two ambulance vehicles would be available in Piedmont thanks to the expansion at the fire department that allows for bay space and living quarters.
Brown said he believed Pafford’s services were “a lot better alternative” to other ideas the council and the fire department has explored.
If the council approves a contract, the city will have to provide a 60 day notice to stop services with EMSA. A new EMS provider could begin as early as June.
