WHITEHALL — The Oct. 20 Fruitland Township board meeting saw over 45 residents attend, many taking to public comment to address their concerns over the township’s consideration of joining the White Lake Ambulance Authority (WLAA) and the funding of this service.
As it stands now, Fruitland Township receives service primarily through Trinity Health EMS; however, WLAA does attend Fruitland emergencies through their Mutual Aid Agreement as backup, but only if both on-call ambulances are available. If the township agreed to enter into service with the WLAA, the township would receive the full benefits of Advanced Life Support and, ideally, shorter wait times for emergency services.
The agreement under consideration was a year's trial run, which would cost the township $200,000. Should the trial run be considered successful, permanent service would then be decided by a millage vote in 2026.
In total, 12 residents spoke, with the overwhelming majority against joining the WLAA. Many voiced concern that they are over-taxed as is.
“We are taxed at one of the highest rates for the services we are provided in the township,” one resident said, especially in comparison to other townships which have “their own township fire department, their own township water, their own township police department.”
One resident even provided their 2022 bill from Meridian Township, which charged two fewer mills but included 10 more line items than Fruitland, adding, “I think that we are being overtaxed already for a township that doesn’t have hardly any infrastructure whatsoever."
Other commenters discussed their belief that paying extra for the service would not see faster response times, especially considering the nationwide EMS and EMT services. Several commenters agreed that the combination of Trinity’s services, WLAA's Mutual Aid Agreement, and Fire EMS first responders, none of which the township currently pays for, were enough.
One commenter did speak out in defense of the service, saying information received from the WLAA’s Sept. 9 public meeting for Fruitland was enough to convince him.
“I personally think $65 (per household) for a year...To have better ambulance service by three times, faster response times, would make sense for my health.”
Other attendees, both in-person and reaching out virtually through Zoom, said they saw the benefits to WLAA’s proposed service, but were concerned over the special assessment, that the assessment would only affect primary residences, and that there was no clear communication to residents prior to this.
“We’re not against ambulance service. We are against being shut out of the decision,” one commenter said.
Several emails and a letter sent to the township and read out loud at the meeting by supervisor Jeff Marcinkowski echoed previous concerns.
Clerk Alexa Steffes, who was in attendance at the previous WLAA public meeting, filled in the rest of the board on the presentation and answered questions made at public comment. The initial $200,000 would be paid through the contingency fund and then assessed back to residents for $56.27 per parcel.
She also clarified that Fruitland Township had been part of the WLAA in the past, but pulled out in 2014 due to worries over mismanaged funds. Since then, major restructuring has occurred, and the board felt the WLAA addressed and fixed the concerns that made Fruitland pull out in the first place. She also pointed out that there was a search for bids, another concern raised by some public commenters, but no other services submitted any quotes.
At the public meeting with WLAA, the authority assured attendees that the response times to Fruitland would improve, and that they were fully prepared to take on the estimated extra 350 calls without an anticipated decrease in the quality of care. The township has the authority to hold a special assessment, but first hosted the Sept. 9 meeting. At that time, the township received positive feedback from the public.
As for the perceived lack of communication, Steffes said, “I want to communicate well with this township. If you’re having issues and you’re not getting our e-news...I want to know about it. Please send me an email directly...because you should be able to get access to our information.”
Following this, the board agreed to suspend Robert’s Rules of Order to allow Jeff Abrams, also in attendance and a member of the WLAA board of directors, to address concerns and answer questions from attendees about the finances and efficiency of the authority.
“We don’t ever want to see it go down the road like it was in the past, and it won't," Abrams said.
While prior questions were addressed by Abrams, many attendees remained unconvinced.
Following the discussion, the assembled public seemed to be more open to joining WLAA for a trial run, so long as the township paid for it out of existing tax revenue.
In the end, the board unanimously approved to take no action until the November meeting in order to ascertain if there were enough funds in the budget to afford the $200,000 trial run and save residents the special assessment of $56.70 per parcel.
The two and a half hour meeting was granted some levity from Dave Rice, who celebrated the completion of all the planned trail construction projects for the Duck Lake Nature Preserve.
“We’re done," Rice said. "We’ve built all three bridges, all three boardwalks, we’ve got a unique trailwork system all throughout that 310 acres...We are very happy, we’re very proud of it. It’s beautiful.”
Rice was sure to thank all 22 volunteers that contributed time to the project by name, as well as to share anecdotes from the time they spent together building this preserve for their community. The rest of the volunteers in turn thanked Rice and presented flowers for his wife, saying, "We helped out, but we didn’t do a tenth of what Dave did.”
