Agenda - 05-23-2005-w1 - Laserfiche WebLink

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U TO: Orange County Board of Commissioners John Link, County Manager FROM: Rod Vi.sser, Assistant County Manager Nick Waters, Airector of Emergency Management DATE: September 29, 1994 RE: Rescue Service Options During the last tew months, we have conducted a series of very productive meetings with various emergency service providers to obtain information concerning the provision of rescue service in Orange County. We have examined how rescue service is currently provided, what options exist for providing that service, and what we think is the best approach for providing rescue service in Orange County today. Our analysis included a review of the different categories of rescue service that are and should be provided; the historical and anticipated incidence of rescue calls in each of those categories; and the current, and desirable future, capabilities of agencies to respond to various categories of rescue calls. The matrix at Attachment 1 represents our effort to succinctly capture the main points of our analysis. During staff and agency discussions, widespread agreement emerged on a number of points and principles: * the driving force behind the structure of rescue service must be the best possible service to Orange County's citizens, regardless of which agencies provide that service; * the moat economical use of limited resources for rescue, being wary of unnecessary duplication of service capability; * the need for extensive coordination and cooperation between the rescue squads, volunteer fire departments, municipal fire departments, Orange County Emergency Management, and other emergency responders; * the focus of rescue service provision should be Countywide, rather than by individual response area; * resources should be allocated in priority to meeting the most likely and frequent categories of rescue calls (primarily light vehicle extrication) while ensuring that a capability to respond to any of the categories of rescue calls exists (among agencies either internal or external to Orange County). A strong spirit of cooperation among emergency response agencies has led to the development of a draft working agreement (Attachment 2) between the South Orange Rescue Squad (SORSj and Qrange County Rescue Squads (OCRs). OCRs has agreed to provide heavy rescue throughout Orange County, SORS will provide technical rescue services throughout Orange County, and the rescue squads and fire departments will work to provide light vehicle extrication, which is by far the most frequently required rescue service. County staff will work with rescue providers to augment their organic rescue capabilities with centralized resources. Centralizing certain resources should help