Ohio fire dept. hopeful grant will help buy ambulance equipment

The department wants to buy a third power cot and loader and a chest compressor for the city’s third ambulance

November 09, 2016 09:05 PM

By Ed Richter
Dayton Daily News

FRANKLIN, Ohio — The city will again submit a grant application in hopes of getting funds to purchase a new fire and rescue vehicle with a price tag of more than $600,000.

Franklin City Council will resubmit its application to the federal Assistance to Firefighters Grant program for $620,490 to purchase a combination fire and rescue vehicle, which would replace a 1991 rescue truck, and to purchase a power cot and other equipment for a third ambulance in the city’s fleet.

The city unsuccessfully applied for the grant in 2015.

Its current heavy rescue truck “was designed for an era gone by,” Fire Chief Jonathan Westendorf said. Parts for the vehicle are no longer available to make needed repairs, he added.

Westendorf told council that replacing the heavy rescue truck with a combination fire and rescue vehicle “will more closely match the modern needs of a combined fire and EMS operation.”

He estimated cost for such a truck at about $600,000.

Also included in that grant application are funding requests for a third power cot and loader ($40,000) and a chest compressor ($13,148) for the city’s third ambulance. The chest compressor is a device used to perform cardiovascular pulmonary resuscitation on a patient.

“We’ve found positive patient outcomes and it has worked well to help the organization as it allows another person to perform other tasks,” he said.

The grant application of $620,490 seeks 95 percent of the total cost of $653,148 for the new fire truck and other equipment.

In other action
Council also approved a resolution to purchase a 2016 ambulance at an amount that was less that what was available through the state purchasing contract for $164,178 in a lease to own arrangement. The city will make three annual payments of $55,964 to purchase the new ambulance.

The purchase would provide about $45,000 in savings to the city’s 2012 projections, Westendorf said.

An ambulance purchased prior to the launch of the Franklin EMS division cost more than $236,000, he said.

Once the new ambulance is delivered, it will replace an ambulance the city inherited when it withdrew as a member of the Joint Emergency Medical Services District.