S.A.F.E.R. Board of Directors

OFFICIAL MEETING MINUTES SOUTH AREA FIRE & EMERGENCY RESPONSE DISTRICT Board of Directors Meeting Monday, September 23, 2024 @ 16:30 A. Call to Order The meeting of the South Area Fire & Emergency Response District Board of Directors was called to order at 16:30 by SAFER Chairman Mark Maloney. Members Present Board of Directors – Cronin, Maloney, Opall, and Schaefer were all present, Langenhahn was absent and excused. Also present: Village of Rib Mountain – Administrator Rhoden; Village of Weston – Administrator Gebert; SAFER – Fire Chief Finke, Deputy Fire Chief Lang, and Administrative Assistant Latimer. B. Correspondence/Comments from the public on issues related to the SAFER District None C. Consent Items Board of Directors approval of prior meeting minutes from August 13, 2024, and approval of expenditures and receipts from August 2024. Motioned by Opall to approve prior meeting minutes from August 13, 2024, and expenditures and receipts from August 2024. Second by Cronin. Motion carried 4:0. D. Business Items Discussion and possible action on EMS Billing Company. - Chief Finke said this is a follow-up to our last discussion. We have narrowed it down to staying where we are with EMS|MC or changing to Cvikota EMS Billing. EMS|MC did move our billing to the States, the last deposit was better and they still have some catching up to do with $290,000.00 behind now. They did make up about $7,000.00. The other company we don’t know what we’re getting, they are a much smaller company, I think we’ll get a better one-on-one service than we do from our current company. EMS|MC does have a lot of resources because they are so big. If we have any medical-legal questions, they have attorneys that they can reach out to. I don’t know if the other agency is going to have resources as much as EMS|MC does, but we don’t use those frequently. - Maloney said you’ve got a memo in here (the packet), that’s referring to this and am I assuming you want to stay with EMS|MC? - Chief Finke said it says we want to strongly consider a change, meaning we want to change from EMS|MC. Action: Motioned by Cronin to give notice to EMS|MC and make a move to Cvikota EMS Billing. Second by Schaefer. Motion carried 4:0. Discussion and possible action on Updates to Ambulance Contracts. - Chief Finke said we have multiple ambulance contracts and when we did our last contract, we had a One-, Three-, Fire-, and Ten-year option. Some of them are not up for renewal yet because they’re under the Ten- year, but we have some up for renewal and we have to give them 90 days' notice. I reviewed what our costs have gone up since we signed the contract in 2019. The amount I came up with, $7.50 per capita and the other item I put in there to consider is if we have any larger municipalities that come in and they have a call  volume of 100 or more, we would waive the $50.00 processing fee per call. The other item I wanted to consider but didn’t put in here is instead of the $7.50 per capita we do $7.75 per capita and we don’t charge the $50.00 processing fee. Action: Motion by Schaefer to Update Ambulance Contracts to $7.75 per capita and eliminate the $50.00 Processing Fee. Second by Opall. Motion carried 4:0. End of Month Budget review. - Chief Finke said the up-to-date budget is in your packet and we continue to run behind on revenue, we did catch up ever so slightly with last month's deposit. Expenditure, we are running under. We did take a hit on our maintenance because we had to put a new pump in one truck that was $23,000.00 unfortunately. Action: Motion by Cronin to Acknowledge the End of Month Budget. Second by Schaefer. Motion carried 4:0. Attorney Referral. - None E. Staff Reports Report from Fire Chief - Fire Chief Finke said we will have our budget to review at our Board meeting on October 8th. - Last week Wausau Fire Department had their Save Station unveiled on the 400 Block. Stevens Point has had one for a while at one of its pickleball courts, and Rhinelander has had one at the pickleball court also. I was thinking as Kennedy Park is getting redone, maybe we could build one of those into that. Report from Deputy Fire Chief - Deputy Fire Chief Lang said the report is in your packet and I’ll give you the highlights. - Personnel report: Engineer Amy Breit put in her notice and has been replaced already from the list. - EMS & Fire Incidents: EMS and fire responses are there. - Training: Training hours are listed with topics. - Apparatus: The platform is here and the initial training from Pierce has been completed. We anticipate the truck being in service in the next several weeks. - Fire Prevention/Public Education: Activities are listed. - Grants/Projects: We put in for a bunch of grants for EMS supplies. F. Remarks from the Board of Directors to set the next meeting date, as well as discuss items for the next meeting agenda. - Next meeting scheduled for Tuesday, October 8, 2024 at SAFER Station 1. - Cronin has nothing. - Maloney has nothing. - Schaefer has nothing. - Opall has nothing. G. Adjourn Motion by Cronin to adjourn. Second by Opall. Motion carried 4:0. Maloney adjourned at 17:13 Respectfully submitted by Cher Latimer, SAFER District Administrative Assistant.