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The United Counties of Prescott and Russell doesn’t want its paramedics to take calls after leaving an Ottawa hospital until they get back to their rural municipality, another jab in its ongoing fight with Ottawa City Hall and Queen’s Park over out-of-territory ambulance service.
“We just pulled the plug and said, OK, enough is enough. We need to take on this challenge,” said Michel Chrétien, the emergency services director for Prescott and Russell.
Prescott and Russell council approved a request by the emergency services department Wednesday after discussing the legal issue in a closed session. The municipality has been growing more bitter about answering Ottawa calls for paramedic service and it’s prepared to make a big move to send a strong message about its annoyance.
Council, through a vote in open session, gave Chrétien the authority to remove ambulances from service between the time they leave an out-of-jurisdiction hospital and the time they arrive back in the municipality. The change will happen at some point over the next 60 days. Chrétien said it’s a management issue, not a legal one.
It’s no coincidence that Prescott and Russell is making the move during a provincial election campaign. The municipality wants paramedic service and ambulance coverage to be a discussion point, Chrétien said.
“We’ve been extremely patient. Two years of trying to resolve this,” Chrétien said in an interview. “It’s gotten to a point where my council and the community here said enough’s enough. We’re just doing our due diligence, basically saying, something is going to happen to our community. We’ll have done the best job we can to be able to protect them, but the ministry and our neighbours are not working with us. What can we do?”
The paramedic file is hot in the Ottawa region. The city has been adding dozens of more paramedics to the service to keep up with growth demands, but there continue to be holdups in health-care delivery. Last week, the city’s emergency and protective services boss sounded the alarm over hospitals taking too long to take transfer of patients. Anthony Di Monte called emergency rooms a “disaster” and blamed hospitals for holding Ottawa paramedics “hostage.”
It wasn’t immediately clear how Prescott and Russell’s plan to stop taking calls on the way back to the municipality will affect the Ottawa Paramedic Service.
Myles Cassidy, the city’s paramedic chief, suggested his operations won’t change.
“The Ottawa Paramedic Service will continue to abide by provisions of the Ambulance Act of Ontario, including sending the closest available ambulance regardless of jurisdiction, and any directive from the Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care,” Cassidy said in an emailed statement.
The 50 paramedics added during the current four-year council term have helped the Ottawa service meet its response time standards, despite seeing increased call volumes, Cassidy said.
Ottawa paramedics also get called into neighbouring municipalities when those areas need coverage assistance, although it’s at a smaller rate.
“The Ottawa Paramedic Service continues to assist neighbouring municipalities when they are in need of our resources,” Cassidy said. “Worthy of note, the province funds 50 per cent of land ambulance service in Ontario. Therefore, Ottawa taxpayers, through their provincial taxes, contribute to land ambulance services in our neighbouring municipalities.”
Chrétien didn’t have at hand the number of times Prescott and Russell ambulances take calls on the way back from out-of-jurisdiction hospitals, but the municipality expects its Ottawa call volume will decrease by 60 per cent when it stops taking calls on the way back to Prescott and Russell.
Prescott and Russell takes every opportunity to needle the City of Ottawa and the provincial government over the number of times county paramedics are required to answer calls in neighbouring municipalities.
The province has a principle of “seamlessness” that says the closest ambulance, no matter which jurisdiction it belongs to, must respond to the call. Most of the drama between Prescott and Russell and Ottawa comes when there’s a spike in calls around central Ottawa, bringing city paramedics closer to the core and leaving the rural areas for neighbouring municipalities’ paramedics to cover.
The City of Ottawa isn’t compelled to compensate other municipalities when their paramedics answer calls in the city.
Prescott and Russell has been particularly vocal and bitter about this. The municipality has sent invoices to Ottawa City Hall and Queen’s Park, knowing it won’t get a cheque in return, and has filed complaints to the province about the number of its ambulances dispatched to Ottawa.
Chrétien dismissed the seamlessness principle because it’s not encoded in legislation or standards. The municipality pays half the cost of land ambulance service and the community should have more say in how ambulances serve its residents, he said.
After becoming increasingly frustrated at providing out-of-territory ambulance service, Prescott and Russell started looking into options early this year. It hired legal firm Hicks Morley to see if the municipality has legal footing to make a big move in the ambulance spat.
Chrétien has a message for the province: “You’ve got a whole bunch of loopholes in your Ambulance Act and we’re challenging them now. A community of our size, 89,000 people, being drained on a regular basis to a city of one million people — it’s not fair.”
The municipality is prepared to face the Ontario Ministry of Health in court if the province challenges the municipality’s move.
The ministry said it was unable to provide a response to Prescott and Russell’s decision on Wednesday.
According to Chrétien, provincial legislation doesn’t compel his ambulances to respond to a call in Ottawa when they’re already in Ottawa.
“We’re not refusing to do a call. We’re basically saying we’re not providing you with a vehicle,” Chrétien said. “That’s up to my council to decide how many vehicles, when, where and why they provide them.”
Chrétien said he’s simply doing something similar to the Ottawa Paramedic Service, which allows a 30-minute no-response buffer at the end of paramedics’ shifts.
jwilling@postmedia.com
twitter.com/JonathanWilling
查看原文...
“We just pulled the plug and said, OK, enough is enough. We need to take on this challenge,” said Michel Chrétien, the emergency services director for Prescott and Russell.
Prescott and Russell council approved a request by the emergency services department Wednesday after discussing the legal issue in a closed session. The municipality has been growing more bitter about answering Ottawa calls for paramedic service and it’s prepared to make a big move to send a strong message about its annoyance.
Council, through a vote in open session, gave Chrétien the authority to remove ambulances from service between the time they leave an out-of-jurisdiction hospital and the time they arrive back in the municipality. The change will happen at some point over the next 60 days. Chrétien said it’s a management issue, not a legal one.
It’s no coincidence that Prescott and Russell is making the move during a provincial election campaign. The municipality wants paramedic service and ambulance coverage to be a discussion point, Chrétien said.
“We’ve been extremely patient. Two years of trying to resolve this,” Chrétien said in an interview. “It’s gotten to a point where my council and the community here said enough’s enough. We’re just doing our due diligence, basically saying, something is going to happen to our community. We’ll have done the best job we can to be able to protect them, but the ministry and our neighbours are not working with us. What can we do?”
The paramedic file is hot in the Ottawa region. The city has been adding dozens of more paramedics to the service to keep up with growth demands, but there continue to be holdups in health-care delivery. Last week, the city’s emergency and protective services boss sounded the alarm over hospitals taking too long to take transfer of patients. Anthony Di Monte called emergency rooms a “disaster” and blamed hospitals for holding Ottawa paramedics “hostage.”
It wasn’t immediately clear how Prescott and Russell’s plan to stop taking calls on the way back to the municipality will affect the Ottawa Paramedic Service.
Myles Cassidy, the city’s paramedic chief, suggested his operations won’t change.
“The Ottawa Paramedic Service will continue to abide by provisions of the Ambulance Act of Ontario, including sending the closest available ambulance regardless of jurisdiction, and any directive from the Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care,” Cassidy said in an emailed statement.
The 50 paramedics added during the current four-year council term have helped the Ottawa service meet its response time standards, despite seeing increased call volumes, Cassidy said.
Ottawa paramedics also get called into neighbouring municipalities when those areas need coverage assistance, although it’s at a smaller rate.
“The Ottawa Paramedic Service continues to assist neighbouring municipalities when they are in need of our resources,” Cassidy said. “Worthy of note, the province funds 50 per cent of land ambulance service in Ontario. Therefore, Ottawa taxpayers, through their provincial taxes, contribute to land ambulance services in our neighbouring municipalities.”
Chrétien didn’t have at hand the number of times Prescott and Russell ambulances take calls on the way back from out-of-jurisdiction hospitals, but the municipality expects its Ottawa call volume will decrease by 60 per cent when it stops taking calls on the way back to Prescott and Russell.
Prescott and Russell takes every opportunity to needle the City of Ottawa and the provincial government over the number of times county paramedics are required to answer calls in neighbouring municipalities.
The province has a principle of “seamlessness” that says the closest ambulance, no matter which jurisdiction it belongs to, must respond to the call. Most of the drama between Prescott and Russell and Ottawa comes when there’s a spike in calls around central Ottawa, bringing city paramedics closer to the core and leaving the rural areas for neighbouring municipalities’ paramedics to cover.
The City of Ottawa isn’t compelled to compensate other municipalities when their paramedics answer calls in the city.
Prescott and Russell has been particularly vocal and bitter about this. The municipality has sent invoices to Ottawa City Hall and Queen’s Park, knowing it won’t get a cheque in return, and has filed complaints to the province about the number of its ambulances dispatched to Ottawa.
Chrétien dismissed the seamlessness principle because it’s not encoded in legislation or standards. The municipality pays half the cost of land ambulance service and the community should have more say in how ambulances serve its residents, he said.
After becoming increasingly frustrated at providing out-of-territory ambulance service, Prescott and Russell started looking into options early this year. It hired legal firm Hicks Morley to see if the municipality has legal footing to make a big move in the ambulance spat.
Chrétien has a message for the province: “You’ve got a whole bunch of loopholes in your Ambulance Act and we’re challenging them now. A community of our size, 89,000 people, being drained on a regular basis to a city of one million people — it’s not fair.”
The municipality is prepared to face the Ontario Ministry of Health in court if the province challenges the municipality’s move.
The ministry said it was unable to provide a response to Prescott and Russell’s decision on Wednesday.
According to Chrétien, provincial legislation doesn’t compel his ambulances to respond to a call in Ottawa when they’re already in Ottawa.
“We’re not refusing to do a call. We’re basically saying we’re not providing you with a vehicle,” Chrétien said. “That’s up to my council to decide how many vehicles, when, where and why they provide them.”
Chrétien said he’s simply doing something similar to the Ottawa Paramedic Service, which allows a 30-minute no-response buffer at the end of paramedics’ shifts.
jwilling@postmedia.com
twitter.com/JonathanWilling
查看原文...
