SOUTHPORT — The aldermen in a neighboring coastal community are calling out their county government for what they consider government overreach and a usurp of power.
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Southport Board of Aldermen held an emergency meeting Monday night regarding changes to its EMS’s reach countywide. Earlier this month, Brunswick County sent three municipalities — Southport, St. James and Bald Head Island — updated EMS franchise agreements. The three municipalities are the only ones with EMS crews of their own and each have concurred to provide mutual aid to surrounding areas when needed.
Southport’s current agreement reads the municipality will “furnish and provide continuing ambulance service to all areas lying within our designated response territorial limits,” according to City Manager Stuart Turille Jr.
A new county agreement has a strikethrough in the last part of the sentence to read “lying within Brunswick County.”
This came as a surprise to the city aldermen, according to Mayor Rich Alt. He told Port City Daily Tuesday changes to the agreement will give Brunswick County’s EMS supervisors the authority to direct Southport’s EMS crews to any emergency in the county. Not only that, he said, but the county wants to disperse crews to stand-by for calls throughout the county.
Alt said if Southport doesn’t participate in the new system, it could have its EMS certification stripped. Though a state credential, county governments are charged with issuing them.
“It would be detrimental to the county if we were to fold up our tent. It would be detrimental to the citizens of Southport,” Alt told PCD. “It’s detrimental to the employees who are now displaced, through no fault of their own. So it’s a no-win under the current program.”
Southport employs five paramedics, 35 EMTs and owns three ambulances, with another on the way. The total EMS budget is $1.07 million, making up 8% of the city’s budget.
“And so there’s a huge expense at our cost, and the county just wants to be able to deploy it whenever they want to, wherever they want to,” Alt said to PCD.
The new agreement was addressed at the Southport Board of Aldermen meeting, where Alt, a former first responder, clarified the issue was not about resistance to helping those outside city limits.
“I want to be perfectly clear: The City of Southport supports mutual aid responses,” Alt told a packed house.
He added the city does not want to create county divisiveness in solving regional county emergencies.
Southport Fire Chief Charles Drew told the alderman he let the county know in July, per a decision made last budget session, that Southport would stop doing standbys with the city’s ambulance outside its jurisdiction. However, he informed the county that a paramedic quick response vehicle could be utilized as available and necessary.
Per Drew, Brunswick County EMS director Lyle Johnston responded in August that “all EMS agencies within Brunswick County fall under the EMS system, as outlined under North Carolina Administrative Code.” Drew said Johnston reminded the city that assistance from its EMS units can be requested at the discretion of Brunswick County’s EMS supervisor.
Then on Oct. 14, a new county-drafted franchise agreement was sent to Drew reflecting the updated language. It also included a note that Southport would have to use county patient software for its EMS system. Drew said it would alter the whole operation and require the city to retrain everyone.
“The language in this new franchise agreement is a grab of power by Brunswick County government,” Drew told commissioners Monday. “We are mutual aid partners. If there is an incident, we will respond to their call for help. We are not saying that we won’t respond. However, dictating that a Southport ambulance should cover calls or standbys in Ash, in Longwood, in Navassa, in Northwest is completely preposterous when the citizens of Southport are paying for this service, and Brunswick County contributes zero.”
Brunswick County Human Services Director Cathy Lytch was present at Monday’s meeting, at the request of Brunswick County Manager Steve Stone. Lytch countered the government overreach narrative, describing the county’s goal as synergetic among all Brunswick EMS systems.
“We don’t want to come and take over what you’re doing, you’re doing a great job,” Lytch said. “But we do have to look at the system as a whole.”
After this article was published, Brunswick County responded to Port City Daily’s inquiries, sent midday Tuesday, regarding the changes. According to spokesperson Meagan Kascsak, the county was taken aback as well after Monday night. Kascsak said the franchise agreement was a draft only, and last week the city and county had already scheduled a meeting to discuss it on Friday, Oct. 25.
“Last night’s emergency meeting and the issues that were expressed at that time were incredibly surprising to us based on the conversations we have been having with them for months now and the fact that we already had a meeting set for staff to discuss this matter together in a few days,” she said.
Furthermore, she said what sparked the change in the mutual aid agreement was the fact that Southport upgraded its care from EMT to paramedic level. Kascsak said the county did not initiate the agreement changes but remained clear it had to follow state law.
She added these conversations with Southport staff were brought up a year ago upon the first mention of the city changing to paramedic level; more so, conversations had been ongoing for up to eight months.
“During that time, Southport acknowledged that they understood standby would be a requirement in the franchise agreement if they upgraded,” Kascsak said.
At Monday’s meeting, Turille Jr. framed the proposed agreement as a response to overdevelopment. Brunswick County has been named the fastest growing county in North Carolina. Turille Jr. said the county has an “EMS service gap” that it desires to fill with municipality staff.
He said the county should be doing simultaneous EMS feasibility planning as development continues forth, to assess impact fees for staffing and satellite stations that could be needed to cover increased calls countywide.
“It’s just logical,” he said. “If you have more buildings, density, you have more service calls.”
Kascsak called the overdevelopment assessment untrue and nothing more than rumors.
“Brunswick County government is not relying on other municipalities for their crews and equipment to respond to EMS calls,” she said. “Brunswick County government has its own robust EMS service and we will respond to all emergencies across the county whenever needed, and our crews will provide mutual aid to our EMS partners including municipalities like Southport whenever help is needed.”
To PCD Tuesday, Alt said he thought the real issue lies in the county government vacancies and “tremendous” staff turnover at the county level. He mentioned there are currently two county stations without a medic crew.
“This is already a stressed system,” Drew said of the county EMS.
Lytch told aldermen Monday evening that the county is hiring currently but added stressors of this job are intense.
“We do continually try to recruit,” she said.
Southport and Brunswick County have had a mutual aid agreement since 1992. It started first with the city’s emergency medical technician program and expanded two years ago to include Southport’s paramedic program. Both are financed by Southport taxpayers only. Before Brunswick County was contributing $36,000, but it stopped in 2016.
“The City of Southport will be underwriting the full cost of an ambulance crew, and more importantly, it will dramatically increase response time to our citizens,” Alt read aloud from a response the city crafted for Monday’s meeting.
This year the department has run 1,187 calls, 593 of those in the months of July, August and September. During those months, the county responded to 44 calls in Southport when its crews were tied up.
Alt said the town had built its own emergency crews to be better equipped to serve its aging population appropriately; 97% are older than 65. The goal was for Southport to keep response times to 5 minutes — the time limit for heart-attack survival.
Chief Drew said Southport’s call responses are roughly 3 minutes and 45 seconds. By expanding the emergency calls into other areas of the county — such as Ash, which is 45 minutes away — Drew was worried the service level would decrease for immediate taxpaying residents.
“If our equipment that we pay for is — let’s say on 211 and 17 — sitting in a parking lot waiting for a call, our response time back just to our city will be so long that if you were having a heart issue, the chances of survival would be minuscule,” Alt said. “And so since we pay for it, we want to run calls in this area.”
Drew told the aldermen, by comparison, the county’s response times average 11 minutes, though Lytch clarified the county’s average response time to Southport is 8 minutes and 24 seconds.
“Minutes make a difference — there’s a helluva difference between 3-and-half minutes and 8, 9 or 10 minutes,” Alderman Frank Lai punctuated with aplomb. “That’s what’s called death.”
Alderman Rebecca Kelley said if the city had to depend on the county a few weeks ago during potential tropical cyclone number eight, she was scared to think of what could have happened. The unnamed storm left people stranded due to washed-out roadways.
“9 minutes is a big deal,” Kelley said. “We need to figure out how to protect that or the county needs to foot the bill.”
Alderman Marc Spencer expressed respect for Commissioner Pat Sykes and said the county board “aren’t demons,” but added the city would have to negotiate.
Alt claimed at the meeting that Chair Randy Thompson knew about the agreement. PCD called each county commissioner Tuesday. Mike Forte and Sykes responded, both stating they had no idea about the updated agreement until the commissioner’s Monday night meeting, when constituents complained about the changes.
Spencer maintained to his fellow aldermen that Southport should oversee its own EMS department.
“The county can reap the benefit of that savings,” he said. “That’s a big thing — they don’t have to come and fill our gap and we’re not going to sell our equipment and give it to them.”
Kascsak told Port City Daily that was not the intent or focus of the county.
“We want to be clear that Brunswick County government is not trying to take over Southport’s EMS service, nor are we relying on other municipalities for their crews and equipment to respond to EMS calls,” she said. “The county does not want to take over any municipality’s or agency’s EMS service and would not even consider it without a formal request coming from a municipality/agency first.”
[Ed. note: The county responded to Port City Daily’s questions after the article was published; this has been updated to reflect their feedback.]
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