City holds public safety referendum workshop; town officials ask questions

By Kim McDarison 

A Fort Atkinson City Council Workshop focusing on the Public Safety Referendum which will appear before voters on the April ballot, was held Wednesday in the training room at the Fort Atkinson Fire Department. 

Along with city council members, the meeting was attended by officials from five towns — Hebron, Jefferson, Koshkonong, Oakland and Sumner — each of whom represent communities holding contracts with the city for EMS services and were invited to ask questions to better understand the public safety referendum and the city’s reasoning for its pursuit. 

Also in attendance were Fort Atkinson City Manager Rebecca Houseman LeMire, Fort Atkinson Fire Chief Daryl Rausch and Fort Atkinson Police Chief Adrian Bump, as well as several members of Ryan Brothers Ambulance Service, including its owner, Erin Ryan. 

In all, nearly 40 people, including city officials, were in attendance. 

After a short presentation, Council President Chris Scherer offered each Fort Atkinson City Council member a chance to speak. He next offered the podium to representatives of the towns, each approaching the podium in the order in which their town was called upon to speak. Other members within the audience were not offered opportunities to speak. 

The council instead noted that other opportunities would be made available to members of the public who wished to address council members and city staff about the upcoming referendum. 

LeMire noted that public meetings to discuss the referendum will be held Tuesday, Feb. 22, and Wednesday, March 9. Those interested in information about the referendum were encouraged to visit: www.fortatkinsonwi.net/referendum, and those with questions were encouraged to email: referendum@fortatkinsonwi.net. 

The workshop was the second time this month representatives from the towns gathered to ask questions about the referendum. A “round table” discussion about the referendum was held Tuesday, Feb. 1, at the Koshkonong Town Hall. During the round table discussion, members from several towns, three of which contract with Fort Atkinson for 911 services, heard a brief presentation from members of Ryan Brothers Ambulance Service’s management team who also answered questions. City officials were not present at the round table discussion. A link to a story about the round table discussion is here: https://fortatkinsononline.com/towns-ryan-brothers-hold-meeting-to-discuss-ems-services/. 

The presentation

In his opening remarks, Scherer thanked the representatives for coming, noting that he hoped city officials could “give you some insight as to why the council has made this decision and why we feel it is the most sustainable option for our public safety futures.” 

Scherer shared experiences he had as a youngster growing up across the street from the Fort Atkinson Fire Station. 

For 18 years, he said, he would hear volunteer firefighters arriving at the station to respond to calls for help from the community. 

When he was younger, he said, calls were less frequent, but the frequency of calls increased over time. 

“Even now, when I come to visit my parents, there’s not a day that I don’t drive into their driveway and see the doors open and ask the guys: How many calls have you been on today? Usually the answer is two, three, sometimes concurrent calls,” he said, adding that it had become apparent that increased call volume would continue into the future.  

“And instead of having it be a crisis, we want to be proactive, we want to start working on it now,” Scherer said. 

Scherer cited several calls that came into the station just before the afternoon’s workshop began.  

“Two calls came in back to back; both medical calls. Our current ambulatory service provider was out of service, which meant that we then had to tackle two ambulatory calls just this afternoon,” he stated. 

Scherer stressed to those in attendance that the referendum was “not a referendum on our ambulatory service provider. This is looking at the sustainable future of fire protection, EMS and policing within Fort Atkinson and how we invest in our townships that contract with us,” he said.  

Aided by a slide presentation, LeMire talked about a need for more full-time personnel at the city’s fire and police departments. 

“The problem is public safety needs of the city of Fort Atkinson are changing, and our ability to respond to those changing needs is limited. 

“Our current public safety funding level and staffing models are insufficient to meet the growing service demands and needs of our community. As a result, the city is asking the Fort Atkinson voters to decide if they would support an increase in the city’s annual tax levy, beginning in 2023 to cover the costs of two additional police officers, six full-time firefighters/paramedics and six full-time firefighter/EMTs,” LeMire said. 

While the referendum includes supports to increase staff in both departments, LeMire said the workshop held Wednesday would focus primarily on the fire department’s needs.  

Offering some history, LeMire said the fire department has had the same number of full-time staff since 1974 and it relies heavily on volunteers. 

“Increased full-time staff would ensure that the needs of the community are met and are not impacted by lack of volunteer staff availability or distance from the station. Adding full-time staff to the department would reduce roll-out times from seven minutes to just 90 seconds for fire calls. Those growing fire needs and the existing unsustainable staffing model at the fire department are the reason we are here today to have a discussion about how the Fort Atkinson public safety referendum and our potential move toward an in-house EMS service by the Fort Atkinson Fire Department may impact your communities,” LeMire told town officials. 

LeMire noted that the intent of the proposal was to bring full-time staffing to the fire department by bringing 911/EMS services in house to offset the cost of the additional personnel.  

LeMire noted that staffing at the fire department “relies heavily” on part-time volunteers, of which there are currently 41. Additionally, the department is staffed by one full-time chief and three full-time division chiefs. 

“While this model has worked in decades past, … it is simply unsustainable relying so heavily on part-time volunteer staff in the growing and anticipated future demand for timely fire responses,” LeMire said. 

Rausch pointed to the relationship between staffing and call volume, saying: “There’s been a significant increase in calls over the years. The current model that we are working under has remained unchanged since about 1974. Most of our community doesn’t recognize that this station is not full of firefighters on a daily basis.” 

Rausch talked about changes made at the fire department starting six years ago, when he arrived as chief.  

Said Rausch: “I took a hard look at the type of calls that we were going on, and I actually modified our response profiles to reduce calls; in fact the first year, we did reduce calls by about 10%. Since then, with no other operational changes, those numbers just keep going up and up. We are seeing  multiple incidents where our EMS service is already busy with calls through no fault of their own. They are meeting the terms of the contract, and we get multiple calls that come in. 

“As we said earlier, the two calls that the fire department’s responding to right now; the private EMS provider is already covering a call. So at this point we have, Ryan Brothers is responding to a call, Fort Atkinson Fire Department is responding to two calls, which, then, in turn brought  a unit from Jefferson because we needed paramedics service for one call and we are not a paramedic level service. At the same time, we had to request for a paramedic ambulance from Milton to cover the second call because we didn’t have anymore vehicles to transport. So we are taking multiple communities out of their home service areas to help provide service to ours.” 

Rausch said responding to 500 calls annually was “over-stressing our volunteers.”  

Defining staffing challenges as “the crux of the matter,” LeMire said, “the city is looking to the proven national model for fire departments for our solution. 

“That model means having cross-trained staff who respond to both fire and EMS calls to provide the community with the greatest level of service in the most cost-effective way.”  

She described the city and towns that contract with the city for EMS as “intertwined geographically and by objective of service provision to our residents.” 

The referendum, she said, “is about choice.”  

She continued: “The decision by the Fort Atkinson City Council, a group of leaders who have been in the Fort Atkinson community for the majority of their lives, to not renew a third-party EMS contract created an opportunity for our community and yours to have choices. Nothing says we or you can’t continue to work with a third-party service if you choose and if they are providing a service that you prefer. 

“Asking Fort Atkinson voters to consider supporting a sustainable alternative really creates flexibility and enables our communities to avoid being locked into contracts with companies that could potentially leave.” 

LeMire next turned the discussion toward costs.  

“What would contracting with the city cost each town, and how would this be different from the current contracts in place?” LeMire asked, and then answered: “We do not anticipate any drastic changes in the contract pricing at this time. If the referendum passes and the towns choose to contract with the city for 911/EMS service, the city anticipates that future contracts would be in line with the current contracts in place.” 

In 2022, she said, she believed the towns were paying $7.22 per capita for EMS. The contract includes an annual increase based on the Consumer Price Index (CPI), she said.  

“The staff would recommend that the city council continue contracts along those lines. It may mirror more of our fire contract, which is CPI in-between 2% and 6%, but it would still be linked between that; it still would be linked to CPI,” LeMire added.  

Would city voters support the referendum, she said, the towns would have the support of more full-time staff at the fire department which would allow for a higher level of service provided at similar cost to what towns pay now. 

“The bottom line is that you all have options. You can continue to contract with Fort Atkinson as an EMS partner or look elsewhere,” she noted. 

Misconceptions 

LeMire addressed what she cited as “a few other misconceptions that we’ve heard: first, in talking about ambulances, currently there is one contracted ambulance dedicated to responding to emergency 911 calls for service, one contracted backup ambulance, which supports nonemergency transport service, and one fire department ambulance staffed by volunteers able to help support when multiple 911 calls come in at one time.” 

She noted that an in-house EMS service would double the city’s capacity to respond to EMS calls by dedicating two ambulances to 911 services.  

“Non-emergency transports would continue to be managed by the hospital who would engage private services to meet that need,” she said.  

Said Rausch: “We are not saying that a private contractor did not provide an adequate level of care. We are saying that with two dedicated 911 ambulances, we won’t have to, the fire department unit — the volunteer unit — won’t have to support the EMS service nearly as much as they do now.” 

In  2021, Rausch said, the fire department responded to 64 EMS calls when the private contractor wasn’t available, resulting in 55 transports by the fire department and one transport provided by the Jefferson Fire and EMS.  

“The second unit for Ryan Brothers is quite often engaged in inter-facility (transports) and not available for that second call. So we end up with more calls than we would have if we had two dedicated ambulances in our district. It is not our intention to get involved with inter-facility transports. Our — Rebecca and mine — opinion is that 911 service should be our priority and leave that inter-facility work for private companies,” Rausch added. 

LeMire sought to provide understanding of patient charges, saying: “While the Fort Atkinson Fire Department does assist on an increasing number of EMS calls, patients are not currently charged for those services. Patients only receive charges by the service provider when transported. There are other scenarios, lift assist for example, when the contracted service provider does charge, but the city does not. And there are no scenarios that I can think of where there would be a double charge for service.” 

Rausch agreed, saying: “If it’s an EMS call, the only one that gets paid is the one that actually transports that individual, unless it’s a cardiac arrest, and then there’s some reimbursement for the work that’s done in that situation. When we send a heavy rescue to assist an ambulance, there is no charge for that; it’s not recorded in our records management system as two calls.”  

Comments from council members

Each council member was next given an opportunity to make a statement.

Said council member Megan Hartwick: “I just had two things, both what I think seemed the biggest misconceptions from folks from at least what I’ve seen online and hearing from people. Not to beat a dead horse, … but, again, just reminding people that this is not about our city addressing a problem with our EMS. This is about our city addressing what we believe to be our number one public safety issue, and that is the firefighter model that we have right now.

“I believe that has been acknowledged from … our third-party contractor.”

Citing a Fort Atkinson Online story, which, Hartwick said, was shared with her by a supervisor from Koshkonong, she noted that Cody Letson, a representative from Ryan Brothers who addressed town officials during a meeting held earlier this month, was quoted in the story as saying: “The chief has told us before that he has no concerns about the service that we provide and our response times, our level of care, everything like that, can’t be improved on, so EMS-wise, I think this is really just based off of them having a need for the fire department.”  

Hartwick described the statement as “an important piece” that “keeps getting muddled up.” 

“This isn’t about issues with our EMS or choosing one EMS over another, this is about fire and EMS as a part of that (staffing) solution,” she said.  

Hartwick asked those interested in learning more about the model and its impacts to talk with volunteers working at the fire station. 

She said when council began discussing the possibility of changing the model, she talked with volunteers and after hearing their responses, she said, “I was pretty floored. I was pretty honored by the vulnerability that a lot of them shared; the mental and physical impact that this change in call service has had on them, … It’s easy to look at the incredible service that our community receives and say: well, this is working. We call 911, there’s a fire, there’s an emergency, there’s an issue in my family or anyone, and somebody shows up. And the piece that we are missing here is it’s not working for the people providing the service anymore. And we can’t continue to ignore that just because it’s working for us.” 

Scherer said “quite a few” of the city’s firefighters live in the towns. He added: “These are your friends, these are your family, that are being called away basically once every 16 hours right now, drop everything, and show up here. We are fortunate that we had a couple weeks notice to be here (at the workshop) at 3 o’clock. They don’t get that notice. They hear a page and they are here. And they are coming from everywhere.”  

Councilman Bruce Johnson described himself as a “firehouse brat,” saying that his father served on the Fort Atkinson Fire Department in a full-time capacity in the mid-1950s, enjoying a 29-year career.  

“I heard more phone calls than Mr. Scherer did or watched across the street. I was woke up every night every time they had it. Back in the mid-50s, Fort had four full-time firemen. We are pretty much at that same pace right now. The assumption that Fort hasn’t grown since then, I don’t think that’s the case at all. The need for more full-time staff has been apparent for a long time. This move is, in my mind, overdue,” Johnson said. 

Said Councilman Mason Becker: “This isn’t just a Fort Atkinson issue. Basically every community throughout the state of Wisconsin is grappling with this right now. The volunteer fire department model is no longer sustainable. I had the opportunity to attend the League of Municipalities conference this past October. Emergency services was the number one topic of discussion. There were multiple numbers of the State Legislature there, and they were willing to talk about it, but they, none of them would commit, or even pretend to promise that the State Legislature is going to do anything that would help with this. Their leadership just simply isn’t going to let them do anything, so this is an issue we have to solve at the local level. It’s certainly not a fun issue; I’m not relishing seeing anybody’s property taxes potentially go up, but we don’t really have any other options. If this referendum fails to pass, it doesn’t mean that things are going to stay the status quo, because the status quo, for our men and women volunteers, in no longer sustainable, and we all have to recognize that. Call volumes for police and fire are higher than they’ve ever been, and we have to make changes.”  

Councilman Brandon Housley noted his agreement with comments made by fellow council members. 

Questions, comments from town officials 

Town of Hebron Board of Supervisors Chairman Ronald Kutz, addressing the council, said: “I’m  grateful for what you’re doing.” 

Town of Jefferson Supervisor Curtis Backlund said he was “involved” with both the Jefferson Fire Department and one in Helenville. 

“I know everyone’s grappling. I think your numbers are low, based on the other departments that I deal with,” he said. 

He suggested the city should develop a “Plan B,” adding: “I just worry that the citizens aren’t going to realize — and I would bet if you polled 100 people in the city, 75% would say the whole fire department’s paid — It’s just unreal that the citizens don’t understand what’s going on. They think it’s like the police department or the sheriff where they are fully funded. So other than that, I don’t really have much to say, but do you have a Plan B? Or is it not where you can talk about it yet.

Scherer responded saying: “I would say it’s not where we can talk about it yet. We wouldn’t have started this without having a Plan B. That Plan B, however, drastically alters what services we can continue to provide for our community. And the reality is the costs will continue to rise and at some point, something will have to be cut or removed. So, yes, Plan B is in discussion, it’s just not a fun discussion that we want to have.”  

Hartwick stressed the importance of “the education piece.” 

Becker noted that often citizens don’t understand the term “paid on call,” which, he noted, “means the same thing as volunteer.” 

“They don’t understand that it’s a much lower stipend that they receive.” he said. 

Backlund noted his awareness that other area departments were “struggling.” He said that he believed other communities would soon find themselves looking at referendums. 

“So from townships, you know, we may get hit from multiple sides because, I agree, the way it’s going, it’s a shame the state isn’t doing anything to help out. I understand some of the reasons why, not that I like them, I think it’s not a good reason, but you kind of understand why they’re doing it, no one wants to get into the political quagmire and that’s very unfortunate because this is a very nonpartisan issue in my mind. It’s safety. But that’s just the reality we are in right now,” Backlund said.  

Responding to comments made by Backlund that the cost figures proposed by the city looked “low,” Rausch said: “What many communities do when they ask for a referendum for public safety is they request the full amount of the cost of the service to be added to the levy. What we have done is looked at cost savings that will be realized by reducing the wages for the paid-on-call people by about 200 calls a year, taking some of our contracted maintenance services for our equipment that currently we’re paying for, bringing that back in house. We looked at the revenue stream that would be coming in, in excess of a half a million dollars a year, from the transports and we put that all together, and also the contract savings which we are paying for, putting that all together, we only are asking from the taxpayers for the difference.”  

Rausch added: “I’m sure that we can provide that service for what we’re asking for.”  

Town of Koshkonong Board of Supervisors Chairman Bill Burlingame asked the city to explain why it did not hire a third-party contractor to help establish “scenarios” that might offer the city alternatives to numbers developed in house. 

LeMire said that while the proposal was built in house, it was based on “lots of years of experience between our current fire chief and the previous fire chief,” which, she said, offered insight into the city’s needs and costs. 

Burlingame noted his concern about future contracts combining fire and EMS services. He addressed LeMire, asking: “You kind of alluded to that you want to put a contract together for fire and EMS together. What does that do to our existing fire contract?”  

Said LeMire: “We actually didn’t say that.”  

Burlingame responded: “Well, you kind of alluded to that. You did.”  

Said LeMire: “Well, we could. I mean that would be an option for certainly in the future.” 

She added that in the future, for towns contracting with the city for both fire and EMS services, there might not be a reason for two separate contracts. 

Burlingame said he understood a need to pay for fire and police personnel, but, he added: “I’m looking at the dollars and cents for our township.” 

Burlingame talked about historical circumstances which led to the signing of a contract between the city and the towns. He said he was among those in support of making the move to a 10-year contract and he had asked other towns to “give up our fire trucks and join the 10-year contract,” he said, adding, “my name is tagged to that.” He added: “I want to make damn sure that whatever we, as the townships, have to go through in the (future) is done properly.” 

He asked why Ryan Brothers, with what he described as 20-25 years worth of history, had not been consulted by the city in developing the proposed EMS plan.  

LeMire noted that Ryan Brothers provides the city with annual reports. 

Hartwick responding to Burlingame, saying: “I think that to that question, it comes back to really that message that we’re trying to make very clear to people — that this is not about the calls or the service or the quality provided by Ryan Brothers. From our perspective, knowing that what we have been addressing from the very beginning is our service, or our fire model service, and then obviously that we are down in police officers as well. I know we are kind of focused on the fire conversation here today. So knowing that it wasn’t about improving the existing third-party service, or, what does their call volume look like? It’s addressing the other problem that we’re having, and again, the only way to make that sustainable is to bring EMS in. So from my perspective, and I can only speak for myself, to me it wouldn’t have made a difference what presentation or information the Ryan Brothers team gave, because that’s not what the problem is. that’s not what we are trying to address and trying to solve. What we are trying to address and solve is the fire model.”  

Said Burlingame: “The fire model, the fire department, not the EMS is what you’re saying? Then why are we here talking about EMS? Because that’s what I alluded that we are coming here to talk about was EMS contract and I understand you as a city are trying to place more full-time people, I get that, but we’re here, or I’m here, as a representative of the township, really wanting and concerned about the EMS. Because right now, I’ve got, I believe, we signed a 10-year contract and we got seven years left on it and I believe it’s got a 36-month clause in it … it says 36-months with a January of the year. So if you want to end our contract, you got to tell us in January and then go forward 36 months from that time.”  

Addressing Burlingame, Scherer said: “Why are you here today? We have asked all of you here because this is part of a public safety referendum. And again, we are looking at this as a preventative measure. You won’t come and talk to us until the day that you don’t have fire service, or you don’t have EMS service, and we never want to see that day happen, but the current trajectory is just not sustainable. So that day will come where all of a sudden you call 911 and your house is on fire and a fire truck wouldn’t show up or it takes half an hour, then we have failed not only our residents, but we’ve failed you guys because you’re contracted with us. So this is our best foot forward to make sure that we are taking care of our residents, we are taking care of firefighters, and we are taking care of the townships. And then when it comes to tax increases, I would say that the Fort Atkinson residents are going to carry more of the weight than the townships. At some point, will every contract be renegotiated? Most likely. I can tell you that I’ll be paying an extra $2.54 a week on my household for fire and EMS services. I’m comfortable paying that extra $2.54 a week and I can’t imagine that that same $2.54 is going to be extended to the townships.” 

Burlingame asked about the use of American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) money.  

LeMire noted that ARPA funds are used within the plan for startup costs only.

Rausch noted that the funds would be used for the initial purchase of equipment, adding: “In our budget, ARPA replacement is built into the budget from the revenues.”  

Burlingame asked for specifics about when the city’s contract with Ryan Brothers would end. 

He also asked about ending scenarios associated with Koshkonong’s contracts with the city. Koshkonong has two: one for EMS and another for fire services. 

Burlingame said he believed the fire contract was for 10 years, and he said, he believed the EMS contract was for one year. “I always thought it kind of rolled from year to year,” he said of the EMS contract. 

LeMire responding saying that the language within the contract held between the city and the town for EMS “mirrors the language that we have in a contract with Ryan Brothers, which, our interpretation is it requires a 13- to 16-month notice, which we did provide at the end of 2021. So our interpretation of the contract is that our contract is terminated at the end of this year, 12/31/22. Now Ryan Brothers disputes that, and … our attorneys are talking about that, and you’re right, that is between us and Ryan Brothers.” 

Said Burlingame: “So at that given time, … What really happens to us? How will it roll over, or, better yet, if the referendum fails, what really is your Plan B for EMS? I mean I don’t worry about fire because I think you’ve got enough equipment and people as of right now.” 

Said LeMire: “We don’t have enough people. That’s the problem. That’s why we are here. We don’t have enough people to provide fire service.”

Said Rausch: “There’s been buildings in your township that have burned down needlessly because our response was just so late.” 

Burlingame said he believed barns were not traditionally saved. 

Said Rausch: “I’m talking about homes.” 

Burlingame reiterated his belief that a study might have been useful.  

Rausch responded, saying: “Three consecutive chiefs have made the exact same recommendation. We know what the issues are. If we would spend $25- or $30,000 for a study, it would tell us what the issues are; we already know what they are. Participation of firefighters in a volunteer model is just not sustainable anymore at this call volume. So what happens if the referendum fails? We probably have to look at what we do. We may have to restrict the type of incidents that we go to.” 

Burlingame pointed to Edgerton’s fire department as a volunteer model that seemed to be working. 

Rausch noted that the Edgerton Fire Department has a staff of at least eight full-time people. He agreed with Burlingame that the Edgerton department also has a large number of volunteers, further noting that, using the new model, Fort Atkinson Fire Department would, too.  

Burlingame asked about the city’s recruiting relationship with area high schools, colleges and tech schools. He said he was under the impression that one had to “know somebody to get into it.”  

Rausch said he was misinformed. 

Walt Christensen, a supervisor in the Town of Koshkonong, asked: “If the town does end up hiring a private EMS contractor, would that town be able to rejoin the city’s system in the future if they didn’t continue with the private contractor?”  

Rausch said that while he could not speak for what future fire chiefs and councils might do, he, as chief, “would certainly be willing to entertain that.” 

Ted Vratny, a supervisor in the Town of Oakland, said: “We’re being killed by public safety costs across the board.” 

In his town, he said, the board contracts with three different agencies for fire and EMS coverage. 

“We are terribly concerned about cost as you go into this model. I have to tell you, with 30 years experience in public safety, working two different states and running the intergovernmental agencies, where we combine services, we went away from individual models, and I think that Jefferson County conducted a study that said that it was feasible to look at fire and EMS service, and I’m really disappointed that that’s not been discussed and looked at. We would love to find a way to get into a consolidated countywide system which would avoid duplication of services, equipment, personnel, and could really be much more cost effective. I’m disappointed that you’ve chosen to go this way. I understand your needs … but I think we’re killing ourselves and we are digging ourselves into a deeper hole that I’m not sure we can afford,” he said.  

Rausch cited a study conducted by the Wisconsin Policy Forum, which, he said, recommended that fire departments “maintain fire staffing in individual departments.” 

He said opportunities to consolidate fire stations and services were hindered by the distance between communities, citing them as “too far apart.” 

Rausch said there was a recommendation to look at a countywide county-managed EMS system, which could be funded by a tax levy without going to a referendum, but, he said, “there was no interest at the county level to manage that service.” 

Another model, Rausch said, looked at creating a countywide levy for EMS tax, which was never brought forward as an option from the county. 

Further, Rausch said, each community wants its own trucks and ambulances. 

“One of the recommendations from the Wisconsin Policy Forum was, well, maybe you could get one ladder truck for the county. What that doesn’t take into consideration is when we need a ladder truck, we generally need three. I would refer you to the D.B. Oaks fire. That’s a very large fire. When the ladder trucks are in use, there’s almost always a need for more than one. They are an expensive piece of equipment. I think Jefferson just ordered one that was in excess of a million dollars. Could we share those resources a little bit better? Absolutely. But, for that to happen, there needs to be leadership at the county level that’s willing to have that discussion,” Rausch said.  

Said Vratny: “I agree with you … but I also have experience that says that if the agency and the entities start talking among themselves, it could move that upward. The change can happen also that way. It doesn’t have to be top down; it can be bottom up.”  

Town of Sumner Board of Supervisors Chairman John Dohner said he was a firefighter for 18 years in Edgerton and still serves on the Edgerton Fire Protection District board. 

He said serving as a board member gives Sumner a seat at the table when the district makes decisions about how money and resources will be used. 

He said towns look for access to a seat at the table so they are “not going to be held hostage for services.” 

“If I could go with one fire department, I would pick one fire department and go with it. It’s a lot easier, because as somebody said before, the money that we put out for fire and EMS is a lot of the budget. If you ever drove through my township and see my roads you’d know what I’m talking about,” Dohner said. 

He added: “As far as when the council president opened up, talking about how you had to send an ambulance out, that’s going to happen. You guys only got two ambulances, that’s why you have the system where you put the call out … that’s going to happen. So I mean that’s no fault of Ryan Brothers or anybody else. If you go this way, it’s going to happen with you guys. My township is still going to be 15,  20 minutes before I can get an ambulance out there. That’s not going to change if you got guys sitting at the station or not. It might save you a couple minutes, but it’s still what’s going to happen out in our township.”

He noted that people living in his town are concerned about tax increases. 

A slide presentation shared with workshop attendees is here: http://fortatkinsononline.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/2.9.22-TOWNS_Fort-Atkinson_Presentation.pdf.