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Wednesday, 22 January 2020 13:00

Driver charged over Webster, O'Neil fatality.

The Lanark County Detachment of the Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) charged the westbound driver involved in a two-vehicle collision on Highway 7 between Drummond Concession 9A and Pauls Road in Drummond-North Elmsley Township just before 2:00 p.m. on November 10, 2019.

The occupants of the eastbound vehicle, D'Thea WEBSTER, age 63 and Maureen O'NEILL, age 81 both of Northbrook, Ontario died as result of their injuries sustained in the collision. 

Police were assisted by members of the Drummond-North Elmsley Fire Department, Lanark County Paramedics and the OPP Traffic Reconstruction Unit and Highway 7 was shut down until around 9:00 p.m. 

The driver, James O'HARA, age 68 of Vancouver, British Columbia was charged under the Highway Traffic Act Section 142 - Fail to Share Half Roadway - Meeting Vehicle.

Published in FRONTENAC COUNTY
Wednesday, 25 May 2016 21:00

Heroes and zeroes at Frontenac County

It was all smiles at the outset of the monthly meeting of Frontenac County Council on Wednesday, May 18 as members of council celebrated with paramedics Joe Ferguson and Dale Hodgins, who were two of 21 winners of Ontario's first-ever Awards for Paramedic Bravery.

The awards were handed out at Queen's Park in Toronto on May 12. The incident that led to the award took place almost 2 ½ years ago.

On December 4, 2013 Ferguson and Hodgins attended a call in which a car went off the road and drove into a house at Centennial Drive and Wheathill Street in Kingston, breaking a major gas line in the process. With the driver still behind the wheel, and gas pouring out of the line, Ferguson and Hodgins rushed in to grab the patient and drag him away from danger. Ferguson and Hodgins administered CPR and the Advanced Life Support cardiac arrest protocol, and the patient was transported to Kingston General Hospital.

To call Ferguson and Hodgins veteran members of Frontenac Paramedic Services is an understatement, since each of them has over 35 years' experience as paramedics.

Recalling the events of the day with the benefit of hindsight, Joe Ferguson said the driver had to be removed from the car using the passenger door because the driver's door was pinned up against a fence.

“We really didn’t give it a second thought,” he said. “We knew this man was unconscious and in distress and we had to get him out of there. It wasn't until the call was over that I realized maybe it was a little dangerous,” he said.

Dale Hodgins described receiving the award as “enormous, a fantastic feeling.”

“What Joe and Dale did that day could have cost them their lives, but they did it regardless. I am humbled to be the chief of a service with such exemplary paramedics as Joe and Dale, and honoured that they received the Ontario Award for Paramedic Bravery," said Paul Charbonneau, Director of Emergency and Transportation Services and Chief of FPS.

“If I ever have a need, I hope one of you comes to help me,” said Frontenac County Warden Frances Smith in presenting certificates to the two paramedics.

Zeroes

After the celebrations came the more dismal task of trying to sort out how land use planning will be administered in Frontenac County going forward. In a proposal that was submitted by Joe Gallivan, the parameters of a planning advisory committee were outlined for Council to consider.

Chief Administrative Officer Kelly Pender pointed out that the establishment of the committee will be mandatory once Bill 73 (The Smart Growth For Our Communities Act) is enacted by the Province of Ontario.

“How we satisfy that requirement is up to us,” Pender said, “we could establish a skeleton committee that meets only once a year, or we could bring in a committee that is responsible for all planning matters, down to minor variations. In this report, Joe has sought a middle ground.

“The purpose of the committee is to be the venue to deal with some of the major long-term planning decisions, providing advice and recommendations to county council. It is not our intention to duplicate the work of township planning departments and committees of adjustments,” he said.

Provision 5 of the terms of reference for the committee includes the following: “When applicable, review and consider reports on the following matters that fall within the mandate of the committee: 1. Subdivision and condominium applications; 2. Extensions of draft plan approvals; 3. County and Township Official Plan amendments; and 4. County and Township Official Plan updates.”

Gallivan explained later that in order to accomplish item 1. on the above list, the advisory committee would conduct public meetings within the member townships as part of the approval process for plans of subdivision and plans of condominium.

Currently those public meetings are being held in front of municipal councils, who then make recommendations to the county, which is the approval authority for them.

These public meetings have been common in South Frontenac Township in recent times, as proposals for larger scale developments have become more common.

“The province is promoting transparency in planning, and this way the public will be in front of the people with the approval authority for plans of subdivision and condominium,” said Gallivan.

The importance of the committee is underpinned by its proposed makeup: the four mayors of the Frontenac townships along with three appointees from the public.

The provincial requirement is only that at least one member of the public be appointed to the planning advisory committee; the rest of the makeup is left to the county to determine.

North Frontenac Mayor Ron Higgins read a prepared statement as soon as the proposed terms of reference for the committee were tabled.

He said that he spent several hours reading all the documentation surrounding the proposal, only to find the proposal had been changed just one day before the council meeting.

Higgins moved that the matter be deferred, and presented a list of further issues to be clarified by county staff before it is brought back to the table. In particular he questioned why the mayors of the townships will be required to sit on the committee.

“My plate is full already, so adding more meetings is an issue, and I don't have expertise in planning either,” said Higgins. “I would like to see a set of options presented for us to consider, as is the case with most of the proposals that come to us. Here we see only one way forward for us to take or leave.”

Warden Frances Smith said she would support a deferral, but that Higgins had included too many conditions that needed clarification.

Deputy Warden (and mayor of South Frontenac) Ron Vandewal took issue with other parts of the terms of reference for the proposed committee, particularly those that pertain to housing and economic development.

In the end, Higgins' motion to defer was altered for clarity and council supported it.

It is unclear if this matter will return in June or July, but CAO Pender indicated it needs to be resolved sooner than later because once Bill 73 is enacted “the province may or may not provide for a grace period before a planning advisory committee needs to be in place.

Deal reached for K&P north of Tichborne.

The first hurdle in securing passage for the K&P Trail between the hamlet of Tichborne and the junction with the Trans-Canada trail in Sharbot Lake has been cleared with a 10-year, renewable agreement between Frontenac County and Suncorps, which owns a piece of the trail just north of the CP rail tracks at the north end of the hamlet.

County staff and community volunteers are working on securing agreements from a series of private landowners along Road 38. Once this leg of the trail can be secured and completed, it will link the Trans-Canada Trail with the Cataraqui Trail at the Harrowsmith junction, ensuring Frontenac County is included in the Trans-Canada trail network.

Published in FRONTENAC COUNTY

Fourteen seniors attended a CPR workshop on March 30 at the Anglican church hall in Sharbot Lake. Headed up by Mark Powell, a local paramedic who works with Frontenac Paramedic Services, the presentation included a plethora of information on administering basic First Aid, like how to apply bandages, dressings, splints, slings and wraps. Other topics included how to identify and treat choking, stroke, heart attacks, bee stings, and nose bleeds and other kinds of bleeds. When I visited, the group was learning how to administer proper CPR and guests were also shown how to use a defibrillator.

Powell said that though the session was not a certified First Aid/CPR course, he was able to pass on a lot of important and helpful information to the seniors, who may not have been totally up to date on the most recent changes to basic First Aid and CPR training techniques. “The main idea is that, 'You can't do what you don't know’ and now that these seniors do know and are up to date on the latest techniques, they can now react to an emergency situation in a more informed and effective way.”

Vikki Newlove, community support service coordinator with Northern Frontenac Community Services (NFCS), who was present at the workshop, said that the session came about through a grant that NFCS received from the Seniors Community Grant Foundation whose goal is to provide information sessions to seniors in the community. Newlove said she and other staff from NFCS spoke to various local seniors groups through the Seniors Community Advisory Network, which is comprised of representatives from the various local seniors groups of Central and North Frontenac. Those representatives in turn advised NFCS staff of the kind of workshops that would most benefit themselves and their members. “We did not want to do a full First Aid/CPR course since most of the seniors have already done that in the past but we just wanted to do a review and allow seniors to have their personal questions answered”, Newlove said. Similarly because many of the First Aid/CPR techniques have changed in recent years, Newlove said that it is important that seniors are kept up to date of those changes. Seniors were also made aware of the numerous defibrillators that are located in the village of Sharbot Lake. Newlove said she was pleased with the turn out to the workshop, which included participants from Ompah, Plevna, Mountain Grove and Sharbot Lake.

Published in CENTRAL FRONTENAC

The Ontario Sunshine List came out last Friday, and while there are still only a few people working for local townships who receive over $100,000 a year in salary (two from South Frontenac, one from North Frontenac) the number at Frontenac County has climbed to 15.

Kelly Pender, the new Chief Administrative Officer, is not one of them because he was only hired in May of 2014, the subject year of the list.

Twelve of the $100,000 plus club at the County comes from employees of Frontenac Paramedic Services (FPS), including Chief Charbonneau and the two deputy chiefs, Gale Chevalier and Dave Gemmill. Most of the rest are supervisors, and two advanced care paramedics, who have come onto the list over the past two years and earned just a bit over $100,000 in 2014.

The minimal difference between the pay of supervisors and some advanced care paramedics, which was illustrated in graphic detail by the Sunshine report, underlines a potential problem in paramedic and other emergency services that has been identified by CAO Pender in the past.

In Frontenac County, the highest paid advanced care paramedic (ACP) earns more than three of the six supervisors, and almost the same as a fourth. And further up the ladder, the deputy chiefs only earn marginally more.

This is not, however, a major concern at FPS, according to Chief Paul Charbonneau.

“Vacant management positions within FPS are most often filled by long serving paramedics who wish to take their career down an administrative path. Many ACPs are quite happy to spend the full duration of their careers on the road providing patient care, and they are well compensated for their technical expertise and life experience.

“It's generally not a wage increase that attracts medics to the administrative side of the industry; supervisors, deputy chiefs, and chiefs find rewards in improving the service as a whole and supporting medics to provide the best patient care possible,” he said.

Principals and vice principals working in rural Frontenac and L&A schools, as well as a number of senior teachers, are featured on the Limestone District School Board's list (which is over 120 names long in total)

As well, among the thousands of police officers in the province who earn over $100,000 per year are a number who work out of the Frontenac Detachment, its Sharbot Lake affiliate, and the Kaladar Detachment.

Published in FRONTENAC COUNTY
Thursday, 24 February 2005 10:09

Parqamedics_unimpressed

Feature artcle, February 24, 2005

Feature article February 24, 2005

LAND O' LAKES NewsWeb Home

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Paramedics unimpressed with County request to amend provincial regulation

by Jeff Green

County of Frontenac Officials were surprised when the Ministry of Labour ruled they must provide a hour break for paramedics after every five hours of continuous work. Although the County has complied with the ruling, it has also petitioned the Province of Ontario, through the Ministry of Labour, to amend the pertinent regulation to include an exemption for paramedics in the employment of municipalities across the Province of Ontario.

This decision has not gone over well with the Kingston paramedics working for the County.

Paramedic Spero Betas told the News that the meal break is a matter of heath and safety.

Were so busy in Kingston that we can go from call to call for our entire 12-hour shift with no chance to eat at all. At a certain point it becomes unsafe to be operating a vehicle or dealing with patient emergencies, he said.

The County responded to the Ministry of Labour ruling by putting extra ambulances on to cover for breaks.

At least now, we know that no matter how busy we are, and how stressed we become, we will have a meal break after five hours. It makes a big difference, Betas added.

Terry Baker, who was a union representative for the Paramedics with the Ontario Public Service Employees Union (OPSEU) before the ambulance service was taken over by the County last year, and who will be involved in negotiating towards a first contract between OPSEU and the County this Spring, said that meal breaks were mentioned every time we met with the Hotel Dieu [the previous operator] and also every time weve met with the County. Finally one of he paramedics complained to the Labour Board. This should not have been a surprise for the County.

Both Begas and Baker said that the issue came to a head in Kingston because it is an extremely busy ambulance service, which has been under-funded for many years.

I also work part time for both the Lennox and Addington ambulance and the Leeds and Grenville ambulance and neither of them are as over extended as Kingston is. We cant handle the call volume, said Begas. If the County is worried about meal breaks, they should put more ambulances on the road. Its as simple as that. The County shouldnt be wasting their money on lawyers, and should realise they have to provide meal breaks. The morale of the paramedics in Kingston is really low.

Terry Baker said the biggest problem we have right now is we dont have enough vehicles on nights, and we definitely dont have enough vehicles on weekends. Baker also said that the general public is not aware of the work paramedics do.

In the rural reaches of Frontenac County, paramedics with the Parham Ambulance Service are not facing increasing call volumes as their urban counterparts are, but the meal break ruling applies to them as well.

As reported in The News last week, service to all of the County is provided from Justus Drive in Kingston during Parham meal breaks.

That wont change any time soon, although Terry Baker did say other arrangements could be made as part of contract negotiations.

Dave Gemmill, the former owner of the Parham ambulance and now an ambulance manager with the County, said the only way around the problem at Parham is to put more rigs on the road. Im confident thats what County Council will do.

Published in 2005 Archives
Friday, 15 July 2005 10:55

Northbrook_ambulance

Feature article, July 14, 2005

Feature article July 14, 2005

LAND O' LAKES NewsWeb Home

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Northbrook Ambulance station gets official opening

by Jeff Green

The ambulance base has been occupied by paramedics since July of last year, but with the opening of a brand new base in Napanee last week, Lennox and Addington County Officials decided to have an opening in Northbrook as well.

There is an ambulance stationed in Northbrook, with two paramedics to staff it, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, but that doesnt mean they are always at Airport road in Northbrook. The Lennox and Addington ambulance service is an integrated service, and when one rural ambulance gets a call, other ambulances are moved to strategic locations to cover more territory.

So, the Northbrook ambulance is often located up Highway 41 towards Denbigh, or south at Erinsville. There are even times when the Northbrook ambulance is called upon to cover for Frontenac County and moves to a location near Arden, or over to Hastings County to cover territory to the west.

George Mapp is one of 23 paramedics who maintain two 24-hour ambulances at the Denbigh and Norhtbrook stations. He says people dont always realise that an ambulance from Northbrook could end up quite far a-field.

If this ambulance from Northbrook happens to be sent to Kingston to transfer a patient, and is just starting back when a call comes from Kingston and it is the closes one to the scene, it will be dispatched to the scene. When the call comes, we go.

Laura Barnett is a relatively new member of the Northbrook team. She says that in the few months shes been working, shes delivered patients to Renfrew, Belleville and Perth, as well as Napanee and Kingston.

Along with ambulances, there is a helipad at Pine Meadow Nursing Home, which is a stones throw from the Northbrook base, for more grave situations.

Obviously when people are located in more remote areas, we cant offer the response times like they can offer in cities; but we do a good job for a rural service, says George Mapp. I got a call a while back from the end of the Hughes Landing road over on Sheldrake Lake. It was 26 minutes from Highway 41, so there was no way we could get there is 13 minutes, but we do the best we can.

Mapp is also licensed to deliver six drug therapies, including nitroglycerin (cardiac) glucacin and glucacell (diabetes), ventolin (lungs), Epiphinephren (allergic reactions, and ASA.

The Northbrook crew uses one of the larger ambulances, which has two stretchers and two extra seats, so it can do multiple transfers.

We cannot transfer two code 4 (the most serious cases) at one time by provincial regulations, but we can do a code 4 and a code 3 transfer, Mapp said.

The ambulance service also works hand in glove with the volunteer firefighters and the OPP.

Firefighters that are trained for emergency medical service are great in accident and fire situations, said Laura Barnett, You can imagine how hard it is to do CPR non-stop for an hour.

Also available from the Northbrook base is an Emergency Vehicle staffed by the base supervisor, who generally works weekdays. The Emergency Vehicle can go out to calls and stabilize patients while waiting for the ambulance to arrive to take them to hospital.

The Northbrook ambulance base was previously located on Highway 41 between Northbrook and Flinton, and there was more drive in traffic at that location than on Airport Road, but people are welcome to come to the new base. Its still best to phone 911 however, because the paramedics are not always stationed at the base.

Published in 2005 Archives
Thursday, 24 September 2009 09:09

Ambulance_09-38

Back to HomeFeature Article - September 24, 2009 Advanced Care Paramedics in Frontenac CountyBy Jeff Green

Not all ambulances run by Frontenac Paramedic Services have the same capacity to deliver emergency medical services.

There are two levels of paramedics working for the service, which serves Kingston and Frontenac County: Primary Care Paramedics (PCPs) – the provincial standard, and Advanced Care Paramedics (ACPs) – an optional higher level service.

Primary Care Paramedics can administer five different drugs, while Advanced Care Paramedics can deliver many more. ACPs can start intravenous drips and use more invasive techniques to remove objects that block airways, among a host of other treatment tools.

Currently five of the six 24-hour Kingston ambulances are staffed with one ACP and one PCP at all times, (pending staff availability) but the 24-hour ambulance that works out of the Parham base in Central Frontenac and the 12-hour ambulance that works out of Lavant Station in North Frontenac are each staffed with 2 PCPs.

In an interview with the News last week, Paul Charbonneau, the Director of Emergency and Transportation Services/Chief of Paramedic Services for the County, described how this discrepancy came about.

“In 1994 the Province of Ontario commenced a ten-year study on the value of Advanced Care Paramedics, It was called OPALS. At 18 sites in Ontario, the province paid the extra cost of establishing ACPs. One of those was at Hotel Dieu hospital, which at that time served the City of Kingston. The province covered 100% of the extra salary, drug and ancillary costs for ACPs.”

When paramedic services were downloaded in 2000 and Frontenac County won the contract to deliver service in the City of Kingston and Frontenac County, the new service took over from Hotel Dieu and the Parham ambulance. At the time, Hotel Dieu had ACPs, Parham didn't. The OPALS study was designed for services that were able to respond to calls within 8 minutes, which precluded rural ambulance services that cover large distances, and the potential advantages of ACPs to rural areas was not part of the study.

When the studied period ended in 2004, it was deemed a mixed success. For example, there was little or no improvement in outcomes for cardiac arrest patients, but there was considerable improvement for patients suffering respiratory distress.

When the study period ended, Frontenac County Paramedic Services was faced with increased costs of $180,000 each year to keep Advanced Care Paramedics working in Kingston, and it has done so.

“We have simply carried on as before once OPALS ended, with ACPs in Kingston but not in Parham. To change that would be a political decision,” Charbonneau said.

In some other jurisdictions in Eastern Ontario, however, ACPs have become the norm, even for rural service. While only two Eastern Ontario jurisdictions, Ottawa and Kingston, were part of the OPALS study, some other jurisdictions have since opted to fund ACPs on their own.

Hastings County has instituted a 1 ACP - 1 PCP system in all their ambulances, even at their rural Bancroft base. The same holds true in the Cornwall area.

Susan Brown is the Manager for Training, Quality Assurance and Program Development for Frontenac County Emergency Services. She is also a qualified Advanced Care Paramedic. She sees some definite advantages to having ACPs in all Frontenac ambulances. Aside from the obvious advantages of bring able to administer intravenous drugs on the spot there are other advantages. One she cited is treatment for diabetics.

Faced with a diabetic whose sugar level has dropped to the point where they are disoriented or even unconscious, a PCP can deliver a rather expensive drug which takes 20 minutes to take effect, while an ACP can administer a drug that costs 50 cents and takes effect almost instantly. “Aside from delivering a better immediate outcome for the patient, the likelihood of a hospital visit being necessary in these cases is diminished, leading to savings for the health care system in addition to better service for the public,” Susan Brown said.

When ACPs are required on a rural call in Frontenac County, the PCP ambulance takes the patient, and the nearest ACP-staffed ambulance heads towards the PCP vehicle. When they meet, the ACP jumps into the other ambulance, which continues on towards the hospital.

In Paul Charbonneau's view, Advanced Care Paramedics fit in with a model of health care wherein the ambulance is seen not as a “simple ride to the hospital” but more as “the hospital coming to the patient”, whether that is at their house or at an accident scene.

When the decision was made earlier this year to build a new ambulance base in South Frontenac to house a 24-hour ambulance, the ambulance service put forward a proposal to include an ACP on each shift, and that was accepted by Frontenac County Council.

But there are still no plans for the Parham and Lavant Station paramedic service to be upgraded.

“We have been focussing on the physical plant of the rural ambulance this year,” Charbonneau said, “and the cost of bringing ACP to the North is not something we have brought to the attention of county council thus far.”

There are some issues that would have to be overcome should ACPs be incorporated into the rural Frontenac service. ACPs need to use their skills in order to maintain their certification, and with lower call volumes in the rural areas, ACPs might be required to work some shifts in other locations in order to keep their status.

There is also a question of the cost of training. A PCP can train for ACP certification on a part-time basis, but they will likely have to sacrifice some shifts in order to do the training, and they must cover the cost of the training as well.

“Frontenac County has never paid for ACP training,” said Paul Charbonneau, “whenever a position has come up we have simply advertised for an ACP to cover it, and upgraded our staffing through hiring.”

In other jurisdictions, however, the employer has subsidized the training, and even more aggressive recruitment has been tried.

“When Hastings County upgraded to ACP, they did it by offering a $10,000 signing bonus for any ACP who would come to work for them,” Paul Charbonneau said.

“There are different ways that ACPs could be brought to the north end of the County. It could be done slowly, through attrition, by hiring ACPs when paramedics leave the service, or though more aggressive means.

“But everything costs money, and those kinds of decisions are up to the politicians” 

Published in 2009 Archives

Photo: Mike Nolan, the Chief of Paramedics in Renfrew County and current President of EMS (Emergency Medical Services) Chiefs of Canada

We all can remember the last time we saw paramedics in action. We can see them carrying their gym bags full of equipment as they tromped into our house to get to whoever was in distress. We can see them wheeling a stretcher towards a flashing white and neon green van in our neighbor's driveway.

The images get burned into our memories.

Mike Nolan, the Chief of Paramedics in Renfrew County and current President of EMS (Emergency Medical Services) Chiefs of Canada, talked to Frontenac County Council about how that image will be changing in the coming years.

It all has to do with making use of the time that paramedic crews now spend waiting for emergency calls to come in. The thrust of community paramedicine, which is something the Mike Nolan has been pioneering in Renfew County, is to make use of that time by working in collaboration with other health and home care professionals to prevent some of the need for emergency calls in the first place

Particularly in rural areas, where the time between calls can be significant, the Renfrew County paramedics have been spending some of that time holding front line clinics, and conducting ad hoc home visits to at-risk patients to provide basic medical assessments and help prevent emergency calls.

One of those clinics is a monthly drop in clinic in Griffith, a community located not far from the northwestern edge of Frontenac County.

“In Griffith a one day a month clinic has drawn 60 patient visits, on average,” said Mike Nolan. “It is staffed by community volunteers, and paramedics who are already on-call. The cost to the health care system is only some diesel.”

There are a variety of paramedicine pilot projects on the go throughout North America, including the ones in Renfrew County.

A small pilot project in Western Eagle County, Colorado has recently been evaluated for health outcomes and cost effectiveness. In Eagle County, 22 at-risk patients received a total of 65 home visits by paramedics. These visits resulted in 58 fewer physician office visits, 8 fewer paramedic transports and emergency room visits, and a reduction of 182 nursing days in long term care, a net savings of almost $200,000 in health care costs, and an improvement in the quality of life for the patients.

Some of the major impacts of paramedicine are in the treatment of diabetes, where the ability of paramedics to administer glucagons to patients reduces risk to patients and saves emergency transports and hospital admissions.

One of the key factors in paramedicine is specific training for paramedics.

“The community paramedic practices within an ‘expanded scope’, which includes the application of specialized skills and protocols beyond the base paramedic training,” according to a white paper on community paramedicine in Canada that Mike Nolan worked on.

Paul Charbonneau, Chief of Paramedic Services in Frontenac County, said, “We have now completed or soon will have a number of new bases constructed, and we have a strong service in place in Frontenac County and Kingston. This represents our future, making full use of our personnel.”

Charbonneau said that one of his Deputy Chiefs is visiting Renfrew County this week to see first hand what paramedicine is all about, and he will be initiating talks with service providers in Frontenac County to see what kinds of projects are likely to work best.

Among the programs that Mike Nolan referred to is a debt forgiveness program for paramedics to allow them to take on the training for advanced care certifications, which greatly expands the number of procedures a paramedic can perform.

Frontenac County currently employs a number of advanced care paramedics, but the northern base in Parham and the post in Ompah are not staffed by advanced care paramedics.

 

Published in FRONTENAC COUNTY
Wednesday, 15 May 2013 20:22

Paramedics Take To The Streets To Protest

Members of OPSEU local 462 braved some windy, cool weather on Saturday morning, gathering on the busy corner of Princess Street and Gardiners Road for an information picket about an ambulance service cut that is slated to take effect in the City of Kingston on May 20.

A 12-hour ambulance shift, and four full-time unionized paramedic positions, will be eliminated as of that day.

The full-time paramedic positions will revert to part-time. The shift, which runs out of the Palace Road ambulance base, is one of three ambulances that run out of that base in the daytime, while two ambulances run overnight.

Shauna Dunn, shop steward with the local, said, “We are here to talk to people about the effect of this on service to Kingston residents, not about the effect on our own members. While we are not happy to lose the positions, we want to point out that the downtown service is in high demand, and the people who will be losing out are the residents of Kingston who will have to wait longer for an ambulance when they need one.”

Dunn said that judging from the number of thumbs up gestures and the honking of horns on Princess Street during the two-hour action, “the people seem to be supportive.”

The local will be holding another information picket in downtown Kingston in the coming days, and will be presenting their case to the Council of the City of Kingston on May 21.

The decision to cut the day shift from Palace Road was made by Frontenac County Council, which is responsible for land ambulance services in Frontenac County and Kingston under contract with the Province of Ontario.

The decision came about soon after OPSEU Local 462 lodged a grievance to the Ontario Labour Board against a new sick time practice that Frontenac County implemented in January. In response to a steady climb in sick time claimed by OPSEU members over a number of years, Frontenac County Chief of Paramedic Services Paul Charbonneau proposed that when Kingston-based paramedics call in sick during day time hours, they not be replaced in certain circumstances. The plan was devised to save 5,000 hours in replacement pay per year.

When the grievance was launched in March, Frontenac County immediately abandoned the plan, and then decided to cut the downtown shift to save on labour costs.

Kingston City Council has no say over how the ambulance service is run. Frontenac County requisitions money each year from the City to cover ambulance costs for Kingston residents. While the province covers 50% of ambulance costs, the City of Kingston is paying over $6 million to the County in 2013 for ambulance services.

Shauna Dunn said that after making a presentation to Frontenac County about the impact of the cuts to City and County residents, OPSEU feels it needs to bring the matter to Kingston City Council as well.

“We don’t understand this cut in service when there is an ageing population in Kingston and Frontenac County, we are seeing a 12% increase in calls each year, and not too long ago management was talking about adding a new night shift in Kingston. We think Kingston City Council needs to look at this,” she said.

Published in FRONTENAC COUNTY

After being rebuffed at Frontenac County Council, the Kingston-based OPSEU local that represents the paramedics in Kingston and Frontenac County are now trying a kind of end-run. They are trying to influence Kingston politicians concerning the delivery of land ambulance service in the city.

There is something odd about this.

You would think that when land ambulance was downloaded from provincial to municipal jurisdiction a little over 10 years ago a city such as Kingston would end up with the responsibility for its own service. But that did not happen. Instead, the contract was granted to the Frontenac Management Board, then a remnant of the former Frontenac County,

The Frontenac Management Board, created at the time of municipal amalgamation in 1998, was responsible primarily for the Fairmount Home long-term care facility. It also mediated the relationship between the City of Kingston and the four Frontenac townships over the delivery of social services in the townships, which were consolidated under the Social Services department of the City of Kingston in 1998.

The Frontenac Management Board was overseen by the four mayors from the Frontenac townships, who met about 10 times a year for an hour or two to make sure everything was on the up and up. It was all very low-key.

Two things happened to change all that. The Management Board needed to upgrade Fairmount Home in the interest of the residents and in line with the changes the Province of Ontario was making to the long term care sector. And when land ambulance was being downloaded, the Frontenac Management Board won the contract to manage it for itself and the City of Kingston.

These two events, coupled with the election of Isabel Turner as Mayor of Kingston, put the Management Board in conflict with the City of Kingston for a few years.

Much of the cost of running, and renovating Fairmount Home, was paid for out of the City of Kingston budget, as was the cost of running land ambulance. But much to the consternation of Mayor Turner and some of her staff, the city did not have jurisdiction. There was a fight, and an eventual agreement, over funding the renovations to Fairmount Home. Isabel Turner did not get re-elected, and since then all relations between the city and the county have been de-politicised.

In order to run land ambulance and the upgraded Fairmount Home facility, the Frontenac Management Board took on more staff and also decided to re-invent itself as the new Frontenac County.

The City of Kingston, with very rare exceptions, had ignored the relationship for at least eight years.

This is the context in which the simmering discontent between Frontenac County and OPSEU Local 462 is falling into.

The paramedics are taking their protest to the streets of Kingston, and to Kingston City Council.

Suddenly, this odd arrangement whereby the city residents pay $6 million each year for ambulance services but have no direct representation on the body (Frontenac County) that makes all decisions about service levels in the city, will be coming to the floor of Kingston City Council.

A member of city council will be raising a question about ambulance service next week, and this will allow OPSEU Local 462 to address city council directly.

Whether city council decides now is the time to start asking questions about the way things are decided, or will decide to stay out of it as they have been doing for years, remains to be seen.

Published in Editorials
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