Hybrid Mutual Aid -A Tale of Two Towns

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shrewcraft

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Here is the problem: Two adjoining towns both about 2 miles square both with volunteer squads, average call volume 400 calls each per year. During daytime both towns have trouble getting out. Many times each town will have a call with 1 member at the building awaiting a crew that never comes but available in the adjioning town is an EMT who may be available.We are looking to come up with a way in which we can "share" or "combine" each others members on a call by call basis. If any of you out there have any ideas or current practices/protocols in use that solve all the problems that come with this.
Problems like dispatching and problems coordinating between 2 different towns, Drivers, EMTS, Locations etc. When does the other town get notified that there is a call in the nieghboring town and that they may need help? Are the volunteers covered by what towns insurance.
Would love some input.
 
Ask a commercial service to station an ambulance or two in your towns during the day?
 
If there are not enough vollies turning out, then you have to go to Plan B. (County coverage).
 
shrewcraft said:
Here is the problem: Two adjoining towns both about 2 miles square both with volunteer squads, average call volume 400 calls each per year. During daytime both towns have trouble getting out. Many times each town will have a call with 1 member at the building awaiting a crew that never comes but available in the adjioning town is an EMT who may be available.We are looking to come up with a way in which we can "share" or "combine" each others members on a call by call basis. If any of you out there have any ideas or current practices/protocols in use that solve all the problems that come with this.
Problems like dispatching and problems coordinating between 2 different towns, Drivers, EMTS, Locations etc. When does the other town get notified that there is a call in the nieghboring town and that they may need help? Are the volunteers covered by what towns insurance.
Would love some input.
Click to expand...

We had a similar problem when I ran volley way back in the hey day. Both companies had about 600 calls per year, and most normal people work during the day. We used alpha page dispatch so the cost of pagers was significantly less vs. the minotors So the two towns came up with a agreement that members from either company can supplement the other company to allow a response in their first due coverage area.

Of course this worked for a little bit. Eventually everyone become members of each others organization. which was perfectly acceptable but became a conflict. Heres what happens

I am a volunteer at Company 1, We have a mutual aid agreement where I can supplement Company 2

Today the OIC at company 1 gets under my skin, so I say well fine then I am taking my GI Joes and going home. Now I only run calls with Company 2 including letting Company 1 turf their calls where they are first due and come in and take the call with Company 2.

Your best bet is to run a study to find out when your most calls come in and when you end up going to mutual aid calls. Since both companies only run a small amount of calls You could come up with a agreement that allows for each company to sponsor 1 paid crew member and staff them accordingly. If you have volunteers available during the day that are willing to run calls. maybe a incentive program can be placed in for Volunteers to run calls.
 
Will 400 calls per year support paid coverage? (salary, benefits, insurance, equipment, etc)
 
I think there are several options.

Remaining completely volunteer, boost membership by recruiting members, specifically from neigboring areas. Providing a first response vehicle to meet on scene and one ambulance, might also help.

One thing that might also help, at both a paid and volunteer level, consider the possibility of a merger or affiliation. If the call volume for each is only about 400 calls per year (roughly one a day) with limited response from each, why not combine the service? Keep your buildings, but the first responser vehicles might meet an ambulance on scene. Have one person from each station, but within one organization. It doubles the membership and has better call volume.


As mentioned, it might also be beneficial to have day time service paid or privatized. Financially you might not be able to provide paid ems in your area but do you have paid squads local that can supplement during the day?


An example of this is at one agency I work for, we provide EMS coverage for free (as in no money from township, just billing revenue) to a neighboring town. Their call volume is also close to 400 per year but we run we have the trucks. We run both IFT and 911. Our total call volume is approximately 40,000 per year with about 34k of that being IFT. Our response times are slightly longer, but not any different then waiting for vollys to respond. They also send first responder vehicles from their FD.
 
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