Fort Bend relocates ambulance units in search of quicker response times

Fort Bend County hopes to improve ambulance response times by moving two units out of Sugar Land, which launched its own 911 service in January.

“Our EMS — Fort Bend County EMS — makes over 25,000 responses a year,” County Judge Bob Hebert said. “Through a partnership with Meadows Place, we’ll be able to provide a much better response in the immediate area.”

One unit, Medic 7, will relocate to the new North East Fort Bend County Volunteer Fire Station off Clodine Road later this year. The second unit, Medic 3, started operating out of a Stafford fire station in the city of Meadows Place on Tuesday.

“In this new location, Medic 3 will be able to respond more efficiently to areas of the county and provide quicker backup to units in the Stafford, Missouri City and northeast areas of Fort Bend County,” county EMS Director Graig Temple said. Faster response times

Fort Bend County operated two ambulances in Sugar Land, although they also were responsible for areas outside the booming city. Unhappy with response times — particularly for life-threatening events — and the quality of records transfers to hospitals, Sugar Land leaders tried unsuccessfully to convince the county to fund additional ambulances. By 2012, the city council had approved funding to expand the fire department to include an ambulance service. That service launched this year, although without the use of common medications.

For years, Fort Bend struggled to meet its goal of reaching 90 percent of scenes in 10 minutes or less, an industry standard, particularly during peak call hours when ambulances were stretched thin across the growing county. Fort Bend leaders say recent pay raises have ended employee disputes that led to a 2013 federal labor investigation and were blamed for low morale that idled ambulances because the county could not hire as fast as paramedics were leaving.

Since taking the helm of Fort Bend’s ambulance service in April, Temple reports that a handful of changes, including where units wait for calls during peak hours, has cut a full minute off the response time to 12 minutes for 90 percent of calls in the county. The average response time is under seven minutes.

For instance, placing Medic 3 in Meadows Place will make it easier to back up units in Stafford and Missouri City that have been swamped during peak call hours.

“Medic 3 had been located in the center of Sugar Land,” Temple said. “Being in Meadows Place, they have better access to the highway and can better assist our other medic units.”

Meadows Place Mayor Charles Jessup lauded the move as an example of intergovernmental cooperation. Preparing for growth

“For a one-square-mile city to have it’s own police force, its own fire station and now, its own fully staffed EMS unit, it’s exciting,” he said. “It’ll not only cover the needs of our special needs community in the Alzheimer’s Center at The Hampton assisted living, but also the future explosion of growth that’s go- ing to happen in Stafford.”

Temple said more work remains to be done to catch up and prepare for future growth. In June, he asked Fort Bend County commissioners to increase the department’s budget by 31 percent for next year so he can add new units and increase staffing.

Some commissioners initially questioned whether such a steep increase was needed because the county was no longer responsible for calls in Sugar Land and could relocate those units.

“I’m not budging whatsoever on what the request is, because I feel very strongly,” he said.

Commissioners will meet later this month to review the second draft of budget requests before crafting a final budget proposal.