Chris S. Coray, Reporter
Rich Civic Times
GARDEN CITY, Utah. November 19,
2014. The Garden City Fire District
Board held its monthly meeting. All
members were present except Perry Wakefield.
County Commissioner Tom Weston and Sheriff Dale Stacey also attended.
The major item of discussion in the meeting was the initiation of an
effort by the fire department to increase coordination and support with Cache
County concerning accidents on US 89 between Garden City and Logan, so that the
nearest agency responds to an emergency in the canyon.
Chief Wahlberg and the board will prepare a draft agreement by December
and hope to have it jointly agreed upon by both counties in January. While the purpose of this effort is to render
needed emergency medical or other assistance in the canyon it does not
in any way involve EMS services provided by Rich County. The proposal discussed would allow for the
Garden City Fire Department to respond automatically to calls for assistance
between the Rich-Cache boundary on US 89 down to the Franklin Basin road in
Cache County. This would be a shorter
run for Rich County than Cache. The word
automatically is an essential and fundamental part of the
agreement. There is already a mutual aid
agreement between the two counties where if one asks the other for assistance
it is provided. If the new agreement
comes to fruition, assistance would be provided automatically, without
Cache County having to ask or invite Rich.
Further, this proposed agreement would involve only the dispatch of fire
department equipment into the described part of Cache County on US 89, not
an ambulance. Chief Wahlberg explained
that in almost all cases medical aid (or extrication equipment usage) could be
made by fire department personnel, most of whom are EMTs. There was a question raised about EMT
training possessed by Rich County personnel versus paramedics in Cache
County. Chief Wahlberg said that in most
cases Cache County sends EMT personnel with the same level of training as Rich,
seldom sending the paramedics.
Commissioner Weston thought this proposal was a good idea and if a
detailed agreement could be reached by both counties he thought that the Rich
County Commission would formally support it.
Sheriff Stacey explained that changing the aid agreement from “if invited”
to “automatically” was a substantial and strong change.
It needs to be repeated that this proposed change would involve the
Garden City Fire Department, its equipment and personnel, and not the Rich
County EMS service. Commissioner Weston
said that he believed the Rich County EMS unit should consider the same kind of
agreement but such a proposal should be initiated by the EMS unit.
As a final note on this topic, it continues to be the case that no
mutual aid agreement exists between Rich County and Bear Lake County, Idaho. Neither county renders emergency public
safety support to the other, the cause of which Commissioner Weston attributed
to lack of legislative agreement between the two entities.
In other work the board rejected both bids for a storage shed and will
re-bid the project. Bonuses for salaries
were approved for Chief Wahlberg ($1,000) and Tiffany Wahlberg, CPA and
accountant for the district ($500). There were minor adjustments made to the
2014 budget and a draft budget was approved for 2015. The public hearing for the 2015 budget will
be Dec 4, 2014, at 6 p.m. Randall Knight
requested an update and review on the department’s 5 year plan.
In January, the Cache County EMS Authority meeting will
include discussion of a written agreement that could provide additional, and
perhaps faster, medical response to people requiring emergency treatment near
the summit of Logan Canyon.
Herald Journal Article, November 21
by Amy Macavinto, Reporter, Herald Journal
On Oct. 29, a Rich County woman was injured in a
single-vehicle rollover on U.S. Highway 89 near the summit of Logan Canyon,
three-fourths of a mile from the Rich County line. She was conscious but not
completely responsive, and it took more than half an hour for an ambulance to
arrive.
Because the crash was in Cache County, emergency responders
in Logan were paged at 10:12 a.m., and a helicopter was requested almost
immediately. The first emergency response vehicle arrived 30 minutes later; the
ambulance arrived at 10:46 a.m.
Meanwhile, 8 miles away, Garden City Fire District Chief
Mike Wahlberg waited, just in case his agency was called to assist.
“Had we known it was my wife, we would have just gone,” he
said.
Wahlberg’s wife is just one of many accident victims to be
injured in the far reaches of Logan Canyon.
Utah Highway Patrol Lt. Lee Perry said the fastest response
time he has ever had to the upper part of the canyon is 20 minutes on a good
fall day with no traffic. Typical response time is 30 to 35 minutes.
But on a snow day, you can expect to add up to an hour of
additional response time, he said, and that’s on top of the time it takes for
someone to get to a location where they are able to report a crash.
Response times to the same area, the upper part of the
canyon, from Rich County could be reduced to as little as 10 minutes.
According to Wahlberg, there is a mutual aid agreement
between the counties, but it only allows one agency to help the other when specifically
asked to do so, and there is no agreement in place that allows for an automatic
response.
Logan City Fire Chief Jeff Peterson said this issue has been
discussed in the past, but a workable agreement was never reached. But, he said
he is all for it.
“Getting help to the people is my absolutely No. 1
priority,” he said.
Wahlberg, who has been chief of Rich’s fire district for a
year, said this is an issue he always intended to address, but his wife’s crash
just accelerated his zeal for it.
“I can’t say enough good about Cache County and Logan Fire,”
Wahlberg said. “They are top-notch at what they do. My opinion is not that
anything is wrong with their service; it is not about the geographical
boundary; it is about who can offer the quickest response.”
“I am not going to rest until I see a solution and get it
fixed,” he said.
According to Wahlberg, the Garden City Fire District has the
ability and resources to reach the scene quickly, start extrication and first
aid.
“We have 27 firefighters, and most of them are EMTs with
advanced-level training,” Wahlberg said.
They are equipped with an engine, a ladder truck and a
rescue-extrication vehicle housed at the fire station in Garden City — 6 miles
to the county line, Wahlberg said.
While he is a full-time chief, the remaining firefighters
are paid on-call volunteers, many of whom live near the station and are able to
respond quickly.
“When we are paged on a run we can usually have units
rolling within four or five minutes,” he said.
Wahlberg said he has no expectations. He just wants to be
able to have the ability to respond, to stabilize a patient and prepare them
for transport.
Even with Rich County’s help, Logan responders will still be
required on scene, and all patients transported by ground ambulance would go to
a Logan hospital because there is not a facility in Rich County.
“Often it is our residents stuck in a wreck,” he said. “The
only thing we gain out of this is the peace of mind, knowing we are taking care
of people.”
According to Perry, this type of agreement exists between
many other agencies and would be nothing but beneficial to drivers in Logan
Canyon.
“It makes a lot of sense for them to work together,” he
said. “I have to applaud those guys for getting together to work this out.”
amacavinta@hjnews.com
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