By Allison Manning
The Columbus Dispatch
COLUMBUS — Some of what worked for the rural Delaware County of four decades ago no longer makes sense, township and city officials say.
At issue for the rapidly growing county is how it provides emergency medical services.
Since 1971, there has been a countywide medic service, funded by a 0.5 percent sales tax. The county has reimbursed both the city of Delaware and Liberty Township fire departments for performing EMS runs, as both communities had medics when the sales tax went into effect.
Now, Genoa Township wants a similar deal. Officials are asking the county for the freedom -- and the funds -- to be the sole EMS provider in the township.
The county, which is seeking bids to build a new EMS station in the township, wants to keep things the way they are.
Genoa Township officials don’t dispute that the county needs to provide some EMS services, especially in the northern, rural parts of the county. But they say there’s no need to double up in the more-populated southern areas that have firefighters trained as medics.
“We argue there is a duplicative service in Genoa Township,” said trustees Chairman Rick Carfagna, whose township surged from 4,000 residents in 1990 to 23,000 today. “Why not take those resources and redeploy them to areas that are underserved or targeted to future development? It would make much more sense to take Medic 7 and move those crews up to the north.”
In the past four months, Genoa Township medics have handled nearly half the medic calls in the township by themselves. In a third of calls, both a county and township medic responded.
Dennis Stapleton, president of the county commissioners, declined to comment until after the county meets with township officials.
County EMS personnel had been housed in the Genoa Township fire station until last year, when the township passed a levy that allowed it to hire more firefighters. The displaced county medics moved to another location in the township, and commissioners have approved $147,000 in renovations for a new home.
County EMS Chief Rob Farmer said that keeping county medics in Genoa Township maintains the level of care for residents, albeit from two locations.
“At the street level, patients are getting taken care of, and calls are being taken care of effectively,” Farmer said.
Local and county officials both say that they don’t want to duplicate services, and that they support the state’s push for consolidation. They differ on what consolidation looks like.
“Frankly, it seems to me there are efficiencies to paying one crew to be the fire and EMS at one time, as opposed to two separate crews,” said Liberty Township administrator David Anderson.
Trustee Barbara Lewis wants Genoa Township firefighters to handle the medic runs.
“You have county EMS coming right behind our EMS,” Lewis said. “It’s a duplication of services. It’s one of the major ways the state is telling local officials to consolidate and don’t duplicate.”
She said that about $500,000 from the county would cover the cost of township EMS service and allow the township to lower the amount collected on its fire levy.
As the county deals with Genoa Township, it also needs to renegotiate agreements with the city of Delaware and Liberty Township. They are working under expired agreements, the city since 2008 and the township since 2010.
Last year, Delaware received more than $546,000 for medic runs; the township got $232,000.
The city is paying an accounting firm to study how much its EMS services cost. That study should be completed in the next few weeks.
Delaware City Manager Tom Homan said questioning how EMS service is provided isn’t an indictment of its quality. “It’s just taking a look at the current model and saying, ‘Is that the right one?’ ” he said.
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