Lethbridge Fire & EMS, Alberta NDP call for cancellation of 911 EMS dispatch consolidation

“I had a good meeting this morning about EMS dispatch with the Mayors of Calgary, Fort McMurray, Lethbridge, and Red Deer. I told the Mayors what I’ve told Albertans: I think consolidating ambulance dispatch into AHS makes sense. It will make the system work better and save money that we’ll reinvest in the health system. Most importantly, the evidence I’ve seen shows it won’t change response times or cause delays for ambulances or other first responders. But I respect the Mayors’ concerns and the information they shared, and I committed to them that we’ll review their concerns and get back to them before the transition begins.”

Alberta NDP Leader Rachel Notley and Lethbridge-West MLA Shannon Phillips joined members of the local emergency services department to call for the change to be cancelled.

Currently, all dispatching for Lethbridge’s fire, paramedics, and police is done out of one building and all are able to work together to coordinate services.

Deputy Chief Kelly L’Hirondelle says this model has worked well for 108 years and believes this change will not be a positive one for the people of Lethbridge.

“With these talks of dispatch being put into an Alberta-wide system and taking away from our municipality, we feel that we can show and we know that patient outcomes will suffer and that our integrated service model will no longer be as successful as it has been in the past.”

He explains that, not only will there be the loss of service integration and cooperation, but those operating the AHS system will not know where each individual ambulance is in the city, so they would be unaware of if one was fairly close to where an emergency was happening.

Warren Nelson, the President of the International Association of Fire Fighters Local 237, adds that a 911 dispatcher who is based out of Calgary might not be familiar with local landmarks that residents might use to describe their location.

Nelson says this could add several minutes to the response time and that “this will ultimately cost lives.”

L’Hirondelle and Nelson both state that they want to keep dispatch services more or less the same that they are now, but they are open to finding any efficiencies that do not compromise patient care and response times.

Local resident Earl Barton shared his story about how his wife passed out unexpectedly in their living room recently.

He was told that all of the ambulances were tied up at the time, but the local dispatchers were able to send a firetruck right away where the members are dually trained as paramedics. She was able to recover.

“This system works. I don’t understand why Alberta Health Services is doing what it’s doing. Personally, I think every citizen in this town needs to stand up and say no.”

The idea from AHS to consolidate these services is nothing new.

When Notley was premier, she heard the same pitch from the provincial health agency in 2016.

AHS states that this change would save around $6-million per year, but Notley claims millions of dollars in costs would be “downloaded” onto municipalities, so there would not actually be any significant savings.

“There is no evidence this will improve service and there is a real chance it will make services worse. In the end, you might, ‘might’ save a very small amount of money, so we concluded that it just wasn’t worth it to roll the dice on such a critical system that puts the lives of Albertans at stake.”

Lethbridge Mayor Chris Spearman estimated last month that the city could find itself paying an additional $2.89-million, while several other Albertan mayors said local staff would be laid off.

Notley demanded that Premier Jason Kenney and Health Minister Tyler Shandro “abandon these plans again and to stop gambling with the safety of this community.”

Phillips took to the mic to ask that her local counterpart, Lethbridge-East MLA Nathan Neudorf, become vocal on this issue and to “put partisanship away and put his city first.”

By having a united front with both MLA’s, the mayor and city council, and first responders, Phillips believes they will be able to convince the UCP government to change its course on this issue.

Neudorf did not attend Thursday’s press conference.

by David Opinko

Lethbridge Fire & EMS, Alberta NDP call for cancellation of 911 EMS dispatch consolidation

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