2012 Vermont Statutes
Title 18 Health
Chapter 17 EMERGENCY MEDICAL SERVICES
§ 909 EMS advisory committee

§ 909. EMS advisory committee

(a) The commissioner shall establish an advisory committee to advise on matters relating to the delivery of emergency medical services (EMS) in Vermont.

(b) The advisory committee shall be chaired by the commissioner or his or her designee and shall include the following 14 other members:

(1) four representatives of EMS districts. The representatives shall be selected by the EMS districts in four regions of the state. Those four regions shall correspond with the geographic lines used by the public safety districts pursuant to 20 V.S.A. § 5. For purposes of this subdivision, an EMS district located in more than one public safety district shall be deemed to be located in the public safety district in which it serves the greatest number of people;

(2) a representative from the Vermont Ambulance Association, or designee;

(3) a representative from the initiative for rural emergency medical services program at the University of Vermont, or designee;

(4) a representative from the Professional Firefighters of Vermont, or designee;

(5) a representative from the Vermont Career Fire Chiefs Association, or designee;

(6) a representative from the Vermont State Firefighters' Association, or designee;

(7) an emergency department director of a Vermont hospital appointed by the Vermont Association of Emergency Department Directors, or designee;

(8) an emergency department nurse manager of a Vermont hospital appointed by the Vermont Association of Emergency Department Nurse Managers, or designee;

(9) a representative from the Vermont State Firefighters' Association who serves on a first response or FAST squad;

(10) a representative from the Vermont Association of Hospitals and Health Systems, or designee; and

(11) a local government member not affiliated with emergency medical services, firefighter services, or hospital services, appointed by the Vermont League of Cities and Towns.

(c) The committee shall meet not less than quarterly in the first year and not less than twice annually each subsequent year and may be convened at any time by the commissioner or his or her designee or at the request of seven committee members.

(d) Beginning January 1, 2014 and for the ensuing two years, the committee shall report annually on the emergency medical services system to the house committees on commerce and economic development and on human services and to the senate committees on economic development, housing and general affairs and on health and welfare. The committee's initial and ensuing reports shall include each EMS district's response times to 911 emergencies in the previous year based on information collected from the Vermont department of health's division of emergency medical services and recommendations on the following:

(1) whether Vermont EMS districts should be consolidated such as along the geographic lines used by the four public safety districts established under 20 V.S.A. § 5;

(2) whether every Vermont municipality should be required to have in effect an emergency medical services plan providing for timely and competent emergency responses; and

(3) whether the state should establish directives addressing when an agency can respond to a nonemergency request for transportation of a patient if doing so will leave the service area unattended or unable to respond to an emergency call in a timely fashion. (Added 2011, No. 155 (Adj. Sess.), § 39.)