(PRESS RELEASE) The City of Wauseon has announced that effective August 1, 2023, the City’s Fire Department will no longer provide non-EMS emergency response services to residents in York Township.
The city’s announcement came shortly after an email on May 16, 2023, by one of the York Township’s Trustees stating that the York Township Trustees would not consider a new contract with the City of Wauseon.
York Township terminated the prior contract effective December 31, 2019, and the parties have been without a contract since that time.
Although York Township terminated the contract between the parties more than three years ago, the City of Wauseon has continued to respond to calls in York Township involving non-EMS emergency matters even though it is without jurisdiction to do so, and York Township is not paying for such services.
At the request of concerned residents of York Township, representatives of the City of Wauseon and Clinton Township Trustees have scheduled a town-hall meeting for Wednesday, June 21, 2023, at 7:00 pm. in Council Chambers at the City of Wauseon Municipal Building, 230 Clinton Street, Wauseon to answer questions about the August 1, 2023, termination of non-EMS emergency response services.
According to City of Wauseon Law Director, Tom McWatters, the York Township Trustees that made it clear to the City of Wauseon at a recent meeting of the Trustees and in the May 16th email they are not interested in contracting with the City and Fire Department for non-EMS emergency response services in York Township.
McWatters sent a letter to the York Township Trustees notifying them of the termination of services via email on May 24, 2023.
The city’s termination of non-EMS response services to York Township residents will have the largest impact, Wauseon Fire Chief Phil Kessler observed, on those residents in the corridor between County Roads 11-13 and County Roads A-H, for which the Wauseon Fire Department is much closer than the Delta Fire Department and is able to respond much quicker than the Delta Fire Department due to distance, among other factors.
“It is the city’s hope,” commented Wauseon’s Mayor Kathy Huner, “that York Township will eventually agree to authorize the Wauseon Fire Department to continue to provide non-EMS emergency response services to the resident of York.”
“Until an agreement to do so is in place, however, the city has no legal authority to respond to such calls in York, and for liability purposes it can no longer do so.”
The Wauseon Fire Department’s termination of non-EMS emergency response services in York Township effective August 1, 2023, will not impact the city’s provision of ambulance services to certain residents of York Township in accordance with the city’s contract with the Fulton County Board of Commissioners, or responses to non-EMS emergency calls in the rare and exceptional circumstances where response is appropriate under any mutual aid agreement in effect.