Response time for EMS plummets under new Port system

Since January, the Port Washington ambulance service has improved its service to residents. Response times have decreased significantly, and the number of times outside ambulance crews have been dispatched to cover Port calls has dropped dramatically, Fire Chief Joe DeBoer said.

And the reason, he said, is simple — a referendum approved by city residents last year to increase the annual tax levy by $1.175 million, allowing the department to hire six full-time firefighter/paramedics to supplement the three full-time paramedics it already had.

“We’re doing significantly better than we were,” DeBoer told the Police and Fire Commission earlier this month.”We’re in a far more secure spot than we were a year ago, even six months ago.”

Response times for the ambulance, which in 2022 averaged 8 minutes, 37 seconds, are now “hovering at or below six minutes,” he said. “And with what we do,  truly seconds matter.”

Even on the fire side of the department, response times have been trimmed, although less drastically, he said.

And the ambulance service, which for years had depended on other departments to cover for it when the city didn’t have the needed manpower, no longer relies on them for everyday matters, DeBoer said.

From January through June, he said, the department only called for mutual aid eight times, and those were to cover when a second ambulance was called out while the first crew was responding to a different call.

“That may seem like a lot, but a year-and-a-half ago we were calling mutual aid to cover the primary ambulance calls half the time,” DeBoer said. 

In 2022, he said, the department called for mutual aid 300 times “and those numbers continued to increase through 2023.”

The eight calls this year represent “a pretty drastic improvement,” DeBoer said.

There were some other instances when mutual aid was sought, he noted, but those were when a third or sometimes a fourth ambulance call came in while crews were out at other calls — situations the department wouldn’t be able to handle in the best of times.

One key to the department’s success, DeBoer said, is that it was ready to hire its new full-time people as soon as the new year began.

“We were lucky to find a pretty well-qualified applicant pool,” he said, adding he feels fortunate because there were 35 to 37 positions open in southeastern Wisconsin in January, “which is crazy.”

The department filled all but one of its six spots — the last position was filled by an emergency medical technician in the department who is attending paramedic school and will graduate at the end of the year.

Since then, DeBoer said, one of the department’s full-time paramedics has resigned to take a job in a hospital, so at the moment there is one job left to fill.

“Getting to that fully staffed thing is a reach,” he said.

The new full-time paramedics “blended into the department pretty seamlessly,” DeBoer said.

Their impact, he added, goes beyond reduced call times and fewer mutual aid calls.

Around the station, they’ve been working on training projects and doing maintenance projects.

“They’ve been picking off some projects that have been on our to-do list for a long time,” DeBoer said. “And that’s taken some of the burden off our part-time personnel.”

DeBoer noted that three of the new full-time paramedics have moved to Port Washington, so there are more first responders available if a large emergency call comes in.

“It’s kind of a two-fold benefit,” he said. “If we have something serious, they’re coming in to help out.”

The additional staffing has also allowed the department to do more in the community, he said, everything from offering CPR classes for lifeguards at the pool to working with Safety Town to helping with the Fourth of July activities.

“We’ve been all over the place,” DeBoer said. “This is our way to support the community and say thank you for supporting us. We knew it was a big ask, especially with the public safety building on the horizon.”

Even with the additional staff members, it’s still sometimes a delicate balance to maintain a full staff around the clock, DeBoer said.

“The staffing model is significantly better but it’s still a little fragile,” he said.

“We’ve had one full-time staff member out on extended medical leave, and we’ve welcomed two babies to our full-time family,” he said, noting both fathers were out at the same time.

To fill their spots, the department used a combination of part-time staff members and overtime, but DeBoer said they’re trying to limit overtime.

“We don’t want to burn out our full-time staff,” he said.

  DeBoer said he’s been pleased with the way the department’s full and part-time staff members have merged, adding everyone’s been flexible and willing to try new ways of doing things.

“There have been a few hiccups, but everybody seems to be getting along really, really well,” he said.

He credited much of the success of the program to retired Fire Chief Mark Mitchell.

“A lot of the credit goes to him for setting us up for success,” DeBoer said.

DeBoer said he hopes people realize the impact the referendum has had.

“I hope it makes it easier for them to rest assured that when they need our service, we are there for them,” he said.