12-14-10 Public Safety CommitteeMinutes
Public Safety Committee Meeting
December 14, 2010
Elected Officials Present: Council Member D. J. Wilson, Committee
Chair
Council Member Adrienne Fraley-Monillas
Staff Present: ACOP Gerry Gannon
City Finance Director Lorenzo Hines
Assistant Fire Chief Mark Correira
FD#1 Finance Director Kathleen Junglov
Fire Marshal John Westfall
Student Representative Peter Gibson
The meeting was called to order by Committee Member Fraley-Monillas at 7:00
p.m.
A. Camping Ordinance
Assistant Police Chief Gerry Gannon presented the proposed camping ordinance
to the Committee. If adopted, the ordinance would add a new section to Title 5 of
the Edmonds Municipal Code. The ordinance would provide a tool to effectively
deal with camping in city parks and public areas, and with individuals who are
living out of their vehicles. ACOP Gannon briefly discussed what the ordinance
would accomplish. He explained the Police Department dealt with an individual
who had been living in a residential neighborhood and had been a nuisance to
the residences in the area. The department had no way of moving him from the
neighborhood. This ordinance would allow the police to enforce a regulation to
move campers from our more isolated parks. The ordinance is very similar to
what is currently in use in the cities of Everett and Lynnwood. The ordinance
was reviewed by the office of the city attorney as to form.
Action: Place on the Council Consent agenda.
B. EMS Transport Fees
Fire Marshal John Westfall introduced Assistant Fire Chief Mark Correira and
Fire District Finance Director Kathleen Junglov who were asked to discuss the
year to date collection revenue specific to EMS transportation fees.
City Finance Director Lorenzo Hines explained that the developed revenue
projections for 2009 and 2010 were $700,000. Collections in these two years
Public Safety Committee Meeting
December 14, 2010
Page 1 of 2
were $610,000 and $685,000, respectively. For 2011, and as the collections
"system" stabilizes and grows, he has projected $750,000.
Finance Director Junglov distributed handouts and explained that Emergency
Medical System (EMS) transportation fees was a new collections program in
2009 for Edmonds when the city fire department initiated the billing process with
a third party vendor. In 2010 the collections program restarted when the City
approved the Interlocal Fire and Emergency Services agreement with Snohomish
Fire District #1 (FD1).
Collections numbers lag the billing numbers in each startup scenario for a term
as the data is developed. For example, the latter 2009 transportation bills will be
collected in 2010 and beyond. As more years of collections experience is
developed, trends will be identified and the program becomes more predictable
and efficient. Projection figures will become better aligned with actuals. The
collections system figures were originally developed with Edmonds medical
incident response data and modeled using the same billing rules as the Everett
Fire Department EMS transport collections program.
A third party vendor, Systems Design, is contracted currently for billing and
collections to FD1 and for the City. They provide periodic and custom reports for
just such ongoing evaluation of revenue and trends analysis.
A few other unforeseen events in 2010 gave cause to lower revenue actuals and
delays in payment; a reduction of Medicare allowable reimbursement for each
transport, state Department of Health Services (DHS) software compatibility
problems that has since been corrected, and the unincorporated Esperance area
served by Edmonds FD in 2009, is now served by FD1 and collections made to
the District.
AC Correira said the reduction of allowable payments from Medicare was
unexpected in a cost -savings measure implemented at Olympia. FD1 is
expecting an additional Medicare allowable reduction in 2011 of (- 0.1 %).
Finance Director Junglov identified a technological efficiency that is now realized
by a new notepad software system used by FD#1 during emergency medical
incidents that directly uploads billing data for Systems Design collections.
Chair Wilson asked for clarifications on document figures. Finance Director
Junglov offered to send approved copies in electronic format for distribution to
City Council members.
Action: None taken.
The meeting adjourned at 7:42 p.m.
Public Safety Committee Meeting
December 14, 2010
Page 2 of 2