EDITORIAL: Voters should be first responders to EMS distress

Sometimes you can’t just say “no.”

This is one of those times. Voters are being asked to approve increased taxes to support stressed emergency medical services in their communities. The answer has to be “yes.”

Referendums for EMS funding are on the April 2 ballot for the City of Port Washington, Village and Town of Grafton, Town of Saukville and City and Town of Cedarburg. They are needed because the communities do not have space under state levy limits to raise taxes enough to cover essential EMS costs.

The main reason for the sharp increase in the cost of first-responder medical care is that the standard of those life-saving services has risen dramatically with advancements in technology and training.

A few people in Port Washington may remember when the first response to a medical emergency arrived in an ambulance made from a stretched Cadillac with a gumball light on top and two volunteers aboard.

Emergency medical services managed by community fire departments in Ozaukee County have come a long way since then, to the point where they are providing first aid at a sophisticated level with advanced technology and highly trained personnel, including paramedics who perform much like physicians in emergency settings.

So much is required of these care providers that the volunteer system that once sustained all local fire department services no longer works and is being replaced by full-time paid health workers.

To pay them, Port Washington is seeking referendum approval to increase the tax levy by $1.2 million per year. The Grafton/Saukville referendum and the Cedarburg referendum are each for a levy hike of $2 million

These are not intended to be stopgap measures. There is no skimping to get by in these proposals. They are meant to fully fund EMS departments now and in each future year.

The funding source that is currently helping to sustain these services, federal pandemic relief money, is running out.

Port Washington proposes to use the increased taxes to retain its three full-time paramedic/firefighters and hire an additional six full-time EMS employees.

The Grafton/Saukville referendum tax increase would be used to hire 13 full-time EMS personnel. The referendum also seeks voter approval of creating a joint Grafton-Saukville Fire Department.

The Cedarburg Fire Department would add eight full-time paramedics.

(An EMS referendum is not on the ballot in the Village of Saukville because the village is able to cover the increased EMS costs without exceeding the levy limit.)

  The tax increases in the affected communities would range from $95 to $52 per $100,000 assessed valuation. These added taxes are not insignificant, but the cost of not approving the referendums would be higher—a cost paid in diminished life-saving services.

The need for EMS has increased with the growth and aging of the population. Staffing has not kept pace. Without a tax increase, Port Washington could not afford around-the-clock ambulance staffing. In all of the communities covered by the referendums, maintaining and improving ambulance response times depend on referendum approval.

Few measures of the quality of living here have advanced as fast and as far as emergency medical services. Lives that would have been lost are being saved, thanks to a tax-supported government service. Residents of our communities are fortunate to have it.

The answer to the EMS funding referendum questions has to be “yes.”