San Juan County clarifies EMS programs, positions

by David Boyle
News Director
Members of the San Juan County Commission updated parts of the county Emergency Medical Service (EMS) programs, approved upgrades at Cal Black airport and accepted funds for homeless services at their latest meeting.
County Manager Mack McDonald explained the updates are intended to provide clarity for the county EMS programs at the October 1 meeting.
“Looking at the time sheets that come in, we’ve noted for several years now that there’s a lot of confusion in how we pay our part-time employees and full-time employees that take care of our ambulance services”
McDonald noted that the former use of a merit system has led to some confusion for how different employees are paid. The accepted scale includes four first responder positions, with three pay-rates for beginning, midpoint and maximum levels of EMT certification.
The updates also include adopting a single 12-hour shift differential. While employees previously could work 12, 24 or 48 hour shifts, county staff say that decreasing the shifts to a standardized 12-hours will help with keeping part-time employees to under 29 hour work-week average.
The shift differential would have on-call responders being paid a flat rate plus their hourly rate for when they respond to calls.
For example, an Emergency Medical Responder (EMR) and Emergency Medical Technician (EMT) Basic would both be paid $40 for being on-call for a shift, with EMT Advanced and Paramedics being $60 and $80.
Additionally the county is raising the rate for transports out of San Juan County that EMT’s occasionally do to bring people to larger medical facilities. EMR/EMT would make their hourly rate with a $150 bonus with $200 and $250 bonus for EMT Advanced and Paramedics.
Additional bonuses of $20 an hour for working events like high school football games and rodeo with a $30 an hour bonus for special events like movie sets, rallies or other requests.
McDonald also proposed hiring one additional full-time employee for six full-time employees to cover the greatest needs for EMT responses in the county with part-time employees equipped to fill in gaps.
The commission also approved a one-time bonus issued to EMT’s with $100 for those with five years of service, $200 for 10 plus years, $300 for 15 plus years and $400 for 20 plus years. The funds for the one-time bonuses will come from federal ARPA funds set aside by the county.
McDonald added they hoped through restructuring and emphasizing transport–which can be profitable for the county–they’ll be able to decrease the program deficit which county staff reported at $179,000 a year to date.
“We’re still running in the red, I don’t want to kid you that we’re not. But the employees need to understand that even though we’ve increased the wage rate–the hourly rates up–to try to be more competitive with the region. The system is something that you’ll never be wealthy off of working for the county. It’s about serving the public, we have some awesome EMT’s.”
Commissioner Jamie Harvey thanked McDonald for the work to get standardization in the county EMT program.
“I know we needed this in writing, it’s been a long time coming and will give us some much needed structure.”
Commissioner Sylvia Stubbs added she knows change is hard but needed.
“This is not something that’s overnight, this is a situation that’s been going for many many years to the point this is like a point of untangling yarn. It’s all tangled up and we cannot figure out what’s what.”
While members of the commission did approve the change they also requested that the item be brought forth to the commission again for review in the near future.
Members of the county commission also approved an agreement to receive $180,000 annually from the Utah Department of Workforce Services over a three-year period.
McDonald explained the county will use the $60,000 received annually to provide homeless services with possible uses including housing stabilization, rent assistance and case management.
McDonald says they’ll use the majority of the funds for a part-time limited-time employee to do marketing of the services, as well as reporting on the funding. McDonald added that the reporting is strict on the funds and that the funds won’t be available for landlords to get back-due rent.
“If people aren’t paying their bills that’s a different thing than ‘hey I’m about to get kicked out and I cannot make ends meet at all.’ There’s an investigation that this individual would take part in with that client to really see if they are just not paying their rent but they have the means to pay it.”
McDonald added that helping victims of domestic violence get their feet under them could be a significant part of the program.
Members of the commission approved the interlocal agreement unanimously.
Members of the commission also approved a grant agreement to provide upgrades to the Cal Black Airport located at Halls Crossing with 90-percent of the funding coming from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).
McDonald explained last year the county upgraded the automated All-Weather System at the airport, the upcoming upgrade at the airport is the taxiway design.
The project, part of the airport masterplan, will extend the taxiway to give additional room for airplane hangars at the airport. The project also will include some improvements to the road into the airport. With the FAA handling the bulk of the project the state will cover 5-percent of the cost of the project with the county covering the remaining 5-percent.
Members of the commission unanimously approved the grant agreement.