Four funding proposals to maintain and upgrade Oxford’s fire and EMS services await township and village voters at the polls May 3.
Voters will be asked to approve two millages and two bond proposals totalling 2.78 mills for the Oxford Fire Department. These ballot proposals include:
n 1.5 mills for fire and EMS operations for five years.
n 1 mill for Advanced Life Support (ALS) services for five years.
n A bond not to exceed $375,000 for a new fire pumper truck. The bond would be paid off with a 0.10 mill levy in December 2005 and an average annual rate of 0.11 mill.
n A bond not to exceed $595,000 for the addition of approximately 4,000 square feet of living quarters to Fire Station #1. The bond would be paid off with a 0.17 mill levy in December 2005 and an average annual rate of 0.17 mill.
A mill is equal to $1 for every $1,000 of a home’s taxable value.
If approved, all four of these ballot proposals would be levied across the entire township (unincorporated areas plus the village) and would replace any existing fire/EMS millages.
Here’s the breakdown on each ballot proposal:
Fire and EMS Operating
Voters are being asked to approve a five-year, 1.5-mill levy to maintain the existing level of fire and EMS services ? no more, no less.
Last year, unincorporated township residents paid 1.3043 mill for fire/EMS services, while village residents paid 1.27 mill. The slight difference is due to the township and village having different fiscal years ? the township’s runs from January to December whereas the village’s runs from July to June.
Since 2000, the township and village have levied separate millages for fire/EMS operations.
The township levies two voter-approved millages, both of which expire with the December 2005 levy.
In October 1999, township voters approved 1.3316 mills for fire/EMS operations. In November 2000, they approved an additional 0.14 mills. As a result of Headlee Amendment rollbacks, the fire millages levied last year were 1.1765 mill and 0.1278 mill (a total of 1.3043 mill).
The village levies its own annual fire/EMS millage by council resolution.
If approved, the 1.5-mill request on the May 3 ballot would be levied equally over the unincorporated and incorporated (village) township beginning with the December 2005 tax levy and ending with the December 2009 levy. The final levy of the existing township fire millages in December 2005 would be voided.
The 1.5-mill request represents a slight increase (roughly 0.2 mill) to cover rising operational costs associated with health insurance, fuel, waste removal, oxygen for EMS, etc., according to Fire Chief Jack LeRoy.
‘The cost of doing business increases annually,? the chief said. Operational costs also increased with the addition of full-time firefighters in recent years. The department currently has four full-time firefighters plus a full-time chief.
Although paid-on-call volunteers form the great majority of the department and will continue to do so for many years to come, LeRoy said more full-timers were needed to answer daytime calls because most paid-on-call firefighters work outside Oxford and are not available.
‘We are more of a bedroom community today than ever before,? said the chief, noting gone are the days when most paid-on-call staff were local school teachers, merchants and others who lived and worked in Oxford.
If the 1.5-mill operating millage request doesn’t pass, LeRoy said ‘we may not have enough money to make ends meet,? which could lead to possible layoffs of full-time personnel or other cuts.
Advanced Life Support Services
In a separate millage request, voters are being asked to approve a new five-year, 1-mill tax which would allow the fire department to establish its own Advanced Life Support services.
ALS offers a much higher level of medical care than Oxford firefighters can currently provide plus transportation to the hospital ? something firefighters can only do now if an ALS ambulance isn’t available.
Right now, Oxford firefighters can provide Basic Life Support, which means they are the first ones to respond in medical emergencies and are charged with stabilizing patients for ALS treatment and transport by the area’s current private ambulance provider, American Medical Response (AMR).
However, LeRoy has expressed repeated concerns over AMR’s response times which average between 16 and 18 minutes. In a heart attack situation, the chief said for every minute that goes by in which a patient doesn’t receive ALS ? which includes things like drug therapy to stabilize heart rates ? their chance of survival decreases by 10 percent. If an ALS unit doesn’t arrive in 10 minutes, ‘they’re dead,? LeRoy said.
A cardiac arrest patient can suffer permanent brain damage within four to six minutes if proper ALS treatment is not administered, according to LeRoy.
The chief noted some specific medical emergencies that occurred in Oxford in 2004 in which AMR took too long to respond ? 33 minutes for a baby not breathing call; 30 minutes for a respiratory distress call; 28 minutes for a Priority One (which means ‘most serious, imminently life-threatening situation) auto accident; 21 minutes for a call involving CPR; and 22 minutes for a stroke call.
Contrast the above incidents and AMR’s 16-to-18-minute average response times with the Oakland County Medical Control Authority’s protocols which require a 12-minute-or-less ALS response time for suburban communities such as Oxford. The national standard for ALS response is six to eight minutes, according to LeRoy.
Unfortunately, the county Medical Control Authority has no legal power to enforce its protocols and LeRoy said his own efforts to get AMR to speed up its response times have been unsuccessful.
However, if Oxford was able to provide its own 24-7 ALS, firefighters could be on scene within four to six minutes, based on current department response time averages. This promptness can increase a patient’s survival rate by 31.6 percent, LeRoy noted.
Instead of stabilizing patients and waiting for ALS and transport from AMR, Oxford firefighters could begin administering ALS upon arrival at the scene and transport patients to the hospital immediately.
LeRoy said ALS treatment is ‘comparable to what you’d receive in the emergency room at any hospital.?
‘We’d be bringing the emergency room to the field,? the chief said.
In addition to gaining faster response times and immediate treatment, LeRoy believes establishing local ALS is necessary because one day AMR could decide to no longer service Oxford because the area’s no longer cost effective.
‘I consider it a very real threat that we will wake up in the community some morning and we won’t have a private transporter available,? the chief said.
Being a private, for-profit company, AMR looks for ways to maximize its profits. These companies make their money on hospital-to-hospital transports and nursing home-to-hospital transports (where they are assured reimbursement), not emergency medical transports, LeRoy explained.
Add to this, the fact the Oxford/Orion area has become an ‘island? surrounded by fire departments that provide their own ALS and ambulance transports, he said.
Fifteen fire agencies in Oakland County have upgraded from basic services to ALS in the past five years. In the last three years, fire departments in Addison, Brandon, Oakland and Independence townships have all implemented their own ALS services.
All this is cutting into the private ambulance providers service base and profit margins. As a result the ambulance companies are taking more ALS units off the road and converting them into ‘basic rigs? for the non-emergency, money-making transports.
Reductions in the number of AMR ambulances on the street means the increasing likelihood of waiting for an ambulance from 14 mile and I-75 or Woodward Avenue or M-59 and Dequindre Road, the chief said.
It also means the increased likelihood that no ambulance will be available and the fire department must either do the transport itself or request transport from a neighboring community’s ALS unit (such Addison) ? situations which have already happened a number of times, according to LeRoy.
These scenarios are unacceptable when every minute counts toward a patient’s survival, LeRoy said.
Even if the ALS millage is approved, it will take 1? to 2 years to get the program up and running, said LeRoy, noting why it’s so important for Oxford to get moving on this as soon as possible.
Establishing ALS program will require hiring a full-time EMS coordinator to set up and manage it (i.e. paperwork, licensing, etc.) plus up to six additional full-time firefighter/paramedics.
The goal is to have both fire stations equipped with an ALS unit and 24-7 staffing to man it.
Weekdays between 5 p.m. and 7 a.m. (hours currently not manned at the stations) and on weekends, the main station at N. Washington and Church would be staffed with 2 firefighters/paramedics (one serving as shift supervisor) while the branch station at W. Drahner and Newman would be staffed with 1 firefighter/paramedic.
Bond for Station #1 Addition
To accommodate 24-7 staffing at Station #1, voters are being asked to approve a five-year, $595,000 bond to pay for construction of an approximately 4,000-square-foot addition.
This addition would house living quarters for fire personnel (i.e. bunkroom, full kitchen, etc.) manning the station 24-7. The branch station already has living quarters.
Living quarters were supposed to built for Station #1 during its construction, however, higher-than-anticipated land acquisition and building costs forced that portion of the project to be cut due to budgetary concerns.
LeRoy said living quarters allow 24-7 staffing which in turn increases response times during off-hours and weekends because someone is always at the stations immediately ready to get the ALS units or fire trucks on the road.
If approved, the bond would only be used if the ALS millage passed too. If the ALS millage doesn’t pass, this bond, whether approved or not, would not be utilized.
Bond for New Fire Pumper Truck
One of the department’s pumper trucks is nearing its 20-year retirement, so voters are being asked to approve a five-year, $375,000 bond to pay for its replacement.
The pumper in question has been in service since 1987 and is due for replacement in 2007, LeRoy said.
All of the department’s apparatus is on a 20-year replacement schedule, the chief explained.
‘At the 20-year mark, we find the cost of maintaining that piece of equipment as a frontline piece of apparatus begins to exceed the value received from it,? LeRoy said. ‘It’s very expensive to maintain as parts become hard-to-get or obsolete, prices become premium on them. We’ve had some (trucks) where we’ve kept them beyond (20 years) and had to fabricate parts because the manufacturer doesn’t keep them in stock.?
The chief noted the old truck also doesn’t comply with new federal safety standards in that it has an ‘open canopy cab? with two seats in the back where the riders are exposed to the elements and danger if there’s a crash.
All new fire apparatus must have a fully-enclosed cab where the occupants are belted in and protected from accidents. The cost to rehabilitate the old pumper and bring it up to today’s standards would only be about $30,000 less than purchasing a new one, said LeRoy, adding it would still have the ‘same old drive line.? The transmission has already been rebuilt once.
Plus, a new enclosed cab would weigh about 800 pounds more requiring the installation of a new front axle on the truck to support it, the chief explained. Finally, LeRoy noted the current pumper’s water tank is made of steel and rusting quite a bit, which can cause leaks, whereas the new tanks are made of plastic and rustproof.