Washington County debates EMS advisory council membership

The Washington County Board of Supervisors discussed plans to establish an Emergency Medical Services Advisory Council at a meeting Tuesday morning.

“The state of Iowa is requiring that an EMS Advisory Council be formed (that will) report to the Board of Supervisors the condition of the EMS system in the county and make recommendations for any improvements,” board member Jack Seward Jr. said. “The Board of Supervisors of course has the last say in it all, but this advisory council will speak directly to us.”

A four-page set of bylaws establishing the council was shared with community officials around the county before being distributed and discussed at the meeting. One point of contention was the council’s membership, which prompted representation concerns from some cities.

“Based on the initial review, the cities of Kalona, Wellman and Riverside would like to formally offer up some suggestions to the Washington County EMS Association,” a letter signed by city administrators from those three towns said. “Our suggestion would be to include representation through the appointment of two city elected officials to represent the northern and southern communities.”

The letter outlined the northern communities as Riverside, Wellman, West Chester and Kalona, and the southern communities as Washington, Ainsworth, Brighton and Crawfordsville.

While board members were open to the concept, there were concerns about reaching consensus in such a large group, which already included 16 people in the proposition.

“The one thing we were focused on when drawing up these bylaws was actually having decisions made versus the number of people on the committee,” Ambulance Services Director Jeremy Peck said. “Any time you put more and more and more and more, you have people that are not going to come to a consensus on what you want. The idea originally was we’d keep it under 10, and then we kept coming up with more people.”

Board member Stan Stoops agreed and proposed a way to downsize the council.

“You could kill two birds with one stone for some of these,” he said. “You could choose somebody off of the emergency management board that is also an advisory or council to the city of Kalona, just as an example … we’ve got a lot of people on there and decisions are going to come harder with that.”

Seward agreed with others’ sentiment but said he was less concerned.

“If we’re talking about an advisory council of 16 people versus 18 people, I don’t think there’s much of a difference there,” he said. “I like Stan’s thought that one person might be able to fill two or three different roles … I would be OK with adding two more, one for the north, one for the south, or lumping them in with (other members.)”

The group would require at least seven members to reach quorum at its meetings, according to a copy of the proposed bylaws.

Board Chair Richard Young said the membership list was shorter than state recommendations. It included the EMS physician director, an EMS educator, a member of the county EMS Association, and designees from the county Mutual Aid Fire Association, law enforcement, communication center, Board of Health, Emergency Management/911 Board, County Ambulance, and hospital administration. It also leaves open space for “two unaffiliated health care workers,” and “up to three other community (volunteers,)” as well as one Board of Supervisors member to vote only as a tiebreaker.

The board settled on removing the requirement for two health care workers, positions that members said could be filled by volunteer community members. In its place, roles would be added for a north and south city representative, keeping membership for the group capped at 16 people.

Young said a first reading of the bylaws would occur at the board meeting next week. A total of two readings are required before enacting the bylaws, according to state code.