VERNON TOWNSHIP — Starting next year, Vernon Township will provide its own ambulance service.
Officials there have decided to deliver the service in house and not continue with the township’s contracted ambulance service provider of the past 50 years. The township will be able to provide the same service in a more fiscally responsible manner for the taxpayers, the township trustee said.
Township board members Marybeth Sears and Gary Sharrett voted 2-0 earlier this week in favor of trustee Florence May’s recommendation to expand the Vernon Township Fire Department to include ambulance service effective Jan. 1. May’s recommendation also included notifying Priority Ambulance — the successor to longtime provider Seals Ambulance — that the township will not be entering into an agreement for 2020.
Priority Ambulance’s service to Vernon Township consists of one ambulance manned 24/7 out of the new Vernon Township fire station on Vitality Drive in Fortville. Priority formerly operated out of 700 W. Broadway, Fortville, which is where the township trustee’s office is now located. Priority Ambulance bought Seals Ambulance, which the township first started contracting with about 50 years ago.
May said at a budget meeting last week that the township owns an ambulance it does not use and pays Priority $300,000 a year, the biggest part of its budget. Priority collected more than $286,000 in billings in 2018, she continued.
May inherited an underwater township EMS fund after taking office in January.
She said her desire to go in house isn’t because of Priority Ambulance’s performance, adding it’s been very good. But the township cannot afford to continue with Priority, and going in house would provide a revenue stream through billing, she continued.
The township sought bids for ambulance service and received responses from Priority Ambulance and Physicians Ambulance Service. While both were slightly less than what the township currently pays and while Physicians offered revenue sharing, neither option was feasible due to the state of the township’s EMS fund, May said.
May said she conservatively estimated it would cost the township $445,000 to match its existing ambulance service and that the expense would be cut down considerably through billing.
“Our goal is to make it sustainable,” she said. “Do I think we’re going to be profitable running it ourselves? No, I don’t. We’re simply going to lose a whole lot less money.”
The township’s next steps will be to hire a part-time EMS coordinator to help facilitate the transition through the end of 2019. That coordinator position will likely turn into a salaried, full-time EMS chief position starting in 2020. The township will also be working on a more detailed budget for its ambulance services, May said.
Vernon Township received a letter of support for the decision from Buck Creek Township Trustee Mel Branson and Buck Creek Township Fire Chief David Sutherlin. The Buck Creek Township Fire Department, which also mans ambulances, provides mutual aid to Vernon Township.
John Jokantas, Hancock County 911 director, also submitted a letter of support, as did Dr. Stephanie Gardner, Hancock Regional Hospital’s EMS medical director.
Before the township board’s vote on the change, Sears and Sharrett advocated for holding off on the decision until a third board member fills the seat of former member Nancy Cushman, who resigned. A Republican caucus is set for Monday, Aug. 26.
“This is a big thing,” Sears said of the ambulance switch.
But May and township trustee office deputy Amanda Fronek said waiting would leave too little time to bring the new board member up to speed and hold a special meeting ahead of the start the township needs to get on its 2020 budgets.
Vernon Township also has an agreement to provide fire protection and ambulance service to Green Township in Madison county. Greg Valentine, Green Township trustee, explained at the Vernon Township Board meeting that his township’s firefighting fund doesn’t have enough to cover the ambulance coverage.
While he has available funding in another fund, state law doesn’t allow him to transfer it to the firefighting fund to pay for ambulance coverage. He can, however, use those funds to buy equipment that he can give to Vernon Township.
“I can’t give money to help pay for ambulance service, but I can buy an item,” he said.
The township intends to purchase a cardiac monitor that will be needed for Vernon Township’s ambulance, Valentine said. May said they cost around $25,000.
