Solution sought for 911 dispatch

By PETER H. MILLIKEN

VINDICATOR STAFF WRITER

YOUNGSTOWN — Mahoning County officials are expressing confidence that agreements can be reached to continue fire and ambulance dispatching after July 31 in western Mahoning County.

Commissioner David Ludt said he asked the fire chiefs in that part of the county if any of them lacked a short-term alternative dispatching plan, and none raised their hands in a Wednesday evening meeting.

“Everybody at this point has short-term coverage and has somebody to answer their calls,” Ludt said Thursday.

Nicholas E. Modarelli, chief assistant county prosecutor, said he is confident short-term arrangements will be made to continue this service during the first two or three weeks of August.

“The fire chiefs involved are on top of the question. Obviously, they’re looking to the long-term solution,” Modarelli said Thursday.

The need for new dispatching arrangements stems from a July 2 notice from MedCorp, which now does such dispatching, that it will close its Mahoning County operations on July 31.

When 911 calls are made for fire and ambulance service in Jackson, Milton, Berlin, Ellsworth and Green townships and Beloit and Craig Beach villages, the county’s 911 center answers the calls and transfers them to MedCorp, which dispatches the proper personnel and vehicles. The townships pay MedCorp for its services.

The county’s 911 center does both the answering and the dispatching for law enforcement services in those communities.

Officials in the affected townships are working on proposals and agreements for fire and ambulance call dispatching to be done after the end of this month by existing governmental dispatching centers, Modarelli said, declining to name the centers publicly. “The township trustees are going to have to pay the cost of that,” he said.

If the county’s 911 center were to eventually assume the fire and ambulance dispatching responsibilities, changes would have to be made in that center’s operating plan, Modarelli said.

“Right now, we don’t have any protocols. We don’t know who to call,” after MedCorp closes its dispatching center, he said. “We don’t have the equipment,” he added.

About 1,200 calls for fire and ambulance service come from the affected townships annually, Modarelli said.

Fire and ambulance dispatching in western Mahoning County is complicated by that area’s fire departments being volunteer operations in which firefighters aren’t housed on the fire station premises, Modarelli explained.

In a special meeting at 7:30 a.m. Saturday in Green Township Hall, Fire Chief Todd Baird, of Green Township, said he’ll be presenting to his township trustees a proposal under which the adjacent Beaver Township would do Green Township’s fire and ambulance dispatching.

Under the arrangement, Beaver Township’s dispatcher would page Green Township firefighters from their homes or jobs to the site of the emergency.

Baird said he didn’t want to discuss specifics of that proposal before that meeting, but he did say it would nearly double Green Township’s cost of fire and ambulance dispatching.

Green Township, which generates between 385 and 485 fire and ambulance calls annually, has been paying MedCorp $5,400 a year for this service, he said.

Beaver Township already dispatches police, fire and ambulance services for itself and Springfield Township.

Whether or not the proposed dispatching deal is approved, Baird said the needs of Green Township’s residents won’t be neglected.

“Green Township is going to be 100 percent covered, even if we have to man the [fire] station,” and dispatch the calls from there, he said.

Maggi A. McGee, county 911 director, declined to comment for this story.