Item D: Eugene Fire & EMS Department Ambulance Service Area Realignment

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ATTACHMENT B M EMORANDUM November 25, 2009 TO: Mayor Kitty Piercy and Eugene City Council Members Mayor Sid Leiken and Springfield City Council Members Commission Chair Peter Sorenson and Lane County Commissioners President Larry von Moos and Lane Rural Fire/Rescue Board Members FROM: Ambulance Transport System Joint Elected Officials Task Force (Mike Clark, Andrea Ortiz, Dave Ralston, Hillary Wylie, Rob Handy, Larry von Moos, and Kevin King) SUBJECT: REPORT AND RECOMMENDATION SUMMARY In view of negative revenue experiences and projections for the ambulance service providers in central Lane County (Eugene Fire & EMS Department, Springfield Fire & Life Safety Depart- ment, and Lane Rural Fire/Rescue District), which were brought on by reduced Medicare reim- bursements and a number of other economic factors, our Task Force was charged earlier this year to study the problem and develop a recommendation, or set of recommendations, to provide for long-term financial stability for this service, without compromising the high quality of prehospi- tal emergency medical care that our constituents expect and deserve. We acknowledge that the provider departments – and their governing bodies – have already ex- pended substantial effort to address this critical public concern, both by taking extraordinary steps to reduce expenditures and by passing extraordinary increases in user fees to offset decreas- ing revenue, but these measures have served only to slow, not stem the fiscal bleeding. Efficien- cies within the scope of each agency’s control have been or are now being implemented. This task force was formed because a solution to this crisis is beyond the capacity and authority of 1