Ryan Spencer
The Keene Sentinel
BRATTLEBORO, Vt. — The town is severing ties with its longtime EMS provider, Rescue Inc., amid a dispute over costs, according to letters between the company and Brattleboro officials.
The Brattleboro Fire Department will transition to offering ambulance services after its contract with Rescue Inc. expires July 1, town officials said in a news release Monday. The town has contracted with the nonprofit since 1966.
Drew Hazelton, Rescue Inc.'s chief of operations, said in an interview Tuesday that Brattleboro is the largest of the 15 towns Rescue Inc. serves, and the nonprofit is headquartered there. The end of the contract will have an impact on the EMS company and these communities, he said.
“We are currently working on what that will look like,” he said. “We’ll be meeting with all our member towns in early May once we’ve had an opportunity to understand what that impact will be.”
Rescue Inc. has more than 50 years of EMS experience in the region, according to Hazelton, which he said makes him doubtful the Brattleboro Fire Department will be able to offer the same level of service.
“It’s a very well designed, proven system,” he said of Rescue Inc. “I think it’s going to be really hard to match in the greater Brattleboro area.”
But town officials said they believe transitioning EMS operations to the Brattleboro Fire Department is in the best interest of the town and its citizens.
Selectboard Chair Ian Goodnow said the fire department already performs many of the services of an EMS provider and is often first on scene to emergency calls.
“I really believe this is a step in the right direction for Brattleboro,” Goodnow said. “I have full faith in the Brattleboro Fire Department to be able to provide exceptional service and EMS function in the future.”
https://www.facebook.com/Rescueincvt/posts/371390384998588
The town’s news release Monday says Brattleboro will contract with Golden Cross Ambulance for one year to supplement the fire department as the town starts up its own ambulance service. Golden Cross will provide two ambulances as well as staff, the release says.
In an email to The Sentinel on Tuesday, Town Manager Yoshi Manale said the new contract with Golden Cross is expected to be about $75,000. He said the startup costs for the fire department to offer EMS response will be about $250,000, much of which will come from savings with the new contract.
In a March 25 letter, which Manale provided to The Sentinel on Tuesday, Hazelton said the town manager notified him in February that Brattleboro is unwilling to pay the assessed rate for Rescue Inc.'s ambulance services. He described the change as “sudden and abrupt.”
But in an undated response letter to Hazelton, Manale and Selectboard Chair Goodnow said the town had not suggested it was ending the contract. Instead, Manale and Goodnow said they asked Rescue Inc. to justify its assessment of $285,000, which they said is four times what similar-sized towns pay.
“The Selectboard and Town Managers’ responsibility is to ensure that Brattleboro residents have the best services at the most reasonable cost,” they said.
Hazelton’s letter also contained accusations “of poor patient turn over, gender discrimination, verbal abuse and [a] general lack of cooperation by certain members of [the Brattleboro Fire Department].”
Manale and Goodnow responded, though, that there is no “poor patient turnover,” and said an in-depth investigation by the town’s human resources department found no evidence related to his other allegations.
Hazelton is also the chair of Vermont EMS District 13, which provides oversight of EMS providers in Windham County. He said in his letter to Manale he continues to oppose the Brattleboro Fire Department’s application to increase its EMS license to the paramedic license.
Manale and Goodnow described Hazelton’s opposition as “a conflict of interest” and called on him to recuse himself from decision-making on the Brattleboro Fire Department’s application.
“We find it disturbing and highly inappropriate for you to present an official opinion regarding BFD’s application for an EMS license to the paramedic level in the letter regarding the contract between Rescue Inc. and Brattleboro,” they said in the letter. “As you are Vermont EMS District 13 Board Chair, it is unprofessional to use that authority to attempt to deny the BFD its new license at the paramedic level in an effort to force the Town of Brattleboro to sign a service contract with Rescue Inc.”
Hazelton told The Sentinel Tuesday that while he has taken steps to recuse himself from any such matter with Brattleboro, the town has not yet submitted a completed application for its paramedic-level license. He said he remains personally opposed to them obtaining that level of license.
“The department lacks the critical oversight to support paramedic-level service,” he said. “They don’t have the clinical expertise to oversee paramedic-level care at this point.”
Brattleboro Fire Lt. Kurt Schmidt told The Sentinel Wednesday that under the fire department’s current EMS license, he and the department’s other paramedics are only allowed to provide care to patients as advanced EMTs. Schmidt said there are certain emergency procedures that paramedics are qualified to perform on patients, such as intubations, that an advanced EMT cannot. Increasing the department’s license to a paramedic license would allow already-certified paramedics to act in that capacity.
The Brattleboro Fire Department has two paramedics, six advanced EMTs and 18 EMTs, seven of whom are taking an advanced EMT class, according to the town’s news release. The department, which plans to add three new personnel at the advanced EMT or paramedic levels, responded to more than half of the EMS calls for service in town last year, the release says.
Fire Chief Leonard Howard said in an interview Tuesday that the department has responded to life-threatening emergency calls since 2000 and is well staffed to perform EMS procedures.
“Change is hard for everybody, and I understand people are going to be uncomfortable,” Howard said. “But I can assure you they are going to receive the same level of service or better. Like any transition, there will be bumps in the road, but we will overcome those bumps; they will make us better.”
Brattleboro will hold three community forums to answer questions about the transition from the private EMS provider to a public service, according to the release. Those forums will be on Monday, April 18, at 6 p.m. at Central Station; Saturday, April 23, at 1 p.m. at Central Station; and Tuesday, April 26, at 6 p.m. at Brooks Memorial Library.
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