By Rose Laudicina
Staff Writer
For Orange County Emergency Management Services, the update list is long and it comes with a big price tag.
The Orange County Board of Commissioners pondered this on Thursday night during a discussion of emergency services coverage, capacity and system improvements.
The board was given a report from county staff that included recommendations for improvements to emergency response times and communication through VIPER (Voice Interoperability Plan for Emergency Responders).
However, the report came without any input or approval of the recommendations from the eight Orange County rural fire departments, Bryan Baker, president of the Orange County Fire Chief’s Association, said in an email to commissioners.
In his email, Baker asked commissioners to seek a more comprehensive approach to improving 911 and first-responder services that would include input from a task force to be co-chaired by two commissioners and should include the county fire and sheriff departments, EMS, 911 center, county medical director and residents.
Commissioners took the email request into account on Thursday when they asked staff to create a work group to engage multiple agencies impacted by decisions regarding emergency-services operations, including police departments and both town and rural fire departments.
The total bill for EMS improvements could cost the county $9 million in initial investments and $3 million in annual operating funding over a three-year period.
Orange County Emergency Services Director Frank Montes de Oca said that many of the improvements could help reduce EMS response times from the current average of 18 minutes to the goal of 12 minutes.
“In order to reduce response times, more units would need to be built near where the calls are coming from,†Montes de Oca said.
Commissioner Earl McKee, who used to be a rural firefighter, said he had heard that the Orange Rural Fire Department wanted to house an ambulance in their new station, which would help improve response times, especially in the rural areas.
“That is an ideal location to serve the northern half of the county,†McKee said.
Commissioner Barry Jacobs voiced concern over whether the requested improvements would reduce response times in the rural areas as well, which he said he doesn’t believe are represented in the 18-minute average.
Jacobs asked for a breakdown of response times by zones, so the board could see the exact response times for every area of the county and determine if proposed changes would help everyone.
Also at the work session, commissioners discussed the impacts of fire-insurance districts.
“Twelve hundred homeowners are impacted by being farther than 6 miles from stations inside their fire-protection district,†Talbert said. “There might be another fire department that could help that is closer than 6 miles, but due to the way the lines are drawn they are not in their jurisdiction.â€
To fix that problem, fire-insurance districts would have to be reworked, which commissioners learned at the meeting they have full authority to do.
“We want to make sure those being negatively impacted by this insurance problem are helped as soon as possible,†board Chair Bernadette Pelissier said.