Oconto Falls Area Ambulance proposes major upgrade

Area municipalities would see improved emergency care, higher costs
By: 
Warren Bluhm
Editor-in-chief

The Oconto Falls Area Ambulance Service is working with local hospitals on an upgrade effort that would make it the first critical-care paramedic service in Oconto County.

The service is owned by the towns of Oconto Falls, Morgan, Stiles and Spruce, the City of Oconto Falls and the Village of Lena. Each municipality has a vote on the board of directors and contributes annual fees to the operation.

Service director Patrick Ahlgrim and his wife, Angie, who are in the last year of their current contract, appeared before the Oconto Falls City Council on April 13 to explain the proposed upgrade.

The service is currently a volunteer advanced emergency medical technician (AEMT) life-support service with 30 self-scheduled members, Angie Ahlgrim explained. This means the first responders and EMTs put themselves on the schedule around their full-time jobs and other activities. About 25% come from outside the service’s coverage area, she said.

The aim is to upgrade the service to a critical-care paramedic service in partnership with HSHS St. Clare Memorial Hospital in Oconto Falls and Bellin Health Oconto, two grades above AEMT and on par with County Rescue/Eagle III, Bay Area Ambulance and Shawano Ambulance. They would be the first paramedic ambulance service of any kind in Oconto County.

Calls have been trending upward — a total of 618 calls since the service moved to a new computerized system last July 1 through March 31. Of those, at least 259 (or 41%) were emergency calls and 192 (31%) were interfacility transfers from St. Clare to facilities in Green Bay, Milwaukee and other communities outside the coverage area.

Those transfers can be tricky to schedule, because by law the ambulance service must have a crew on standby for 911 calls at all times. A second crew is needed to make the transfer, and volunteers are not always available, the Ahlgrims said.

Patrick Ahlgrim took over as service director in 2018, and among the first orders of business was making sure a two-person crew was in place when 911 call goes out, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.

If a crew is not available, the service is required to contact the emergency dispatch center and say “We don’t have anyone for this chunk of time; if anyone calls, please page out Gillett or Oconto,” which had not always been happening, Patrick Ahlgrim said.

The couple met with other area ambulance services to see if it was a better idea for one of those services to come in and take over for the good of the community, Angie Ahlgrim told the council.

“After those conversations we decided that neither of us is a quitter, and we wanted to try and push forward with a heavy recruitment campaign,” she said. That campaign brought 10 new people to take the class (four passed and became first responders), and it’s been a while since the area was left without a local crew on standby.

“We’ve had some close calls, but we’ve never actually had to take ourselves out of service since we righted the ship,” Patrick Ahlgrim said.

They have been meeting with hospital officials to discuss the idea of an upgrade, which would mean hiring full-time paramedics and seeing a significant increase in operating costs.

“They were very enthusiastic with the conversation, and they’re currently helping us look into other grants and rural funding efforts, things of that nature,” he said.

Even if grants can be obtained, each municipality would be asked to contribute up to twice the current rate. In the city’s case, that means a jump from the current $40,560 annually to an estimated $79,207.83, starting Jan. 1, 2022, Patrick Ahlgrim said.

The increased budget would accommodate three two-person crews, each working two 24-hour shifts a week, for a total of 12 staff members in all.

“We’d still be trying to retain our volunteers the best that we could in hopes that we could have two volunteers on the schedule 24/7 with the full-time crews,” Patrick Ahlgrim said.

Council members asked about the Oconto Falls Area service’s current financial condition.

“Year to year, we’re breaking even. Right now we’re bringing in exactly what we’re paying our people,” Angie Ahlgrim said.

“We’re solvent enough that at the end of the year, the last two years, we were able to make significant equipment purchases that otherwise we weren’t ready to budget for,” Patrick Ahlgrim added.

He said that included two cardiac monitors and an automated CPR device, with all surplus funds invested back into the service.

“We have all of the equipment that we need to make this jump,” he said. The additional funding is needed to hire paramedics and get people trained.

The council was cautiously supportive of the proposal and asked for more details.

“Budgets are a little tight, so we gotta figure out where to come up with that (money) if we decide to move forward with this,” Alderman Devin Wirtz said. “It would be helpful to have numbers on paper.”

The Ahlgrims promised to provide all the information the council needs as soon as possible.

“Our budget process always starts around the end of August, so the earlier we can have something to kind of start looking at, the better,” Alderman Mat McDermid said.

The Ahlgrims are planning to make their presentation to the Town of Oconto Falls annual meeting on April 20, and they plan to present to the Morgan Town Board when it meets at 7 p.m. Monday, April 26, at the Town Hall, 3276 County Road C.