The Portage Board of Works gave the fire department the go-ahead to buy what officials want to be its last ambulance Tuesday, which is good news for taxpayers, officials said.
The new ambulance will replace an older model, but the key is that the city then will be able to refurbish its existing ambulance boxes — where treatment takes place in the vehicle — at between 30 percent and 45 percent cost savings from now on, said Dan Kodicek, assistant fire chief for emergency medical services.
The idea is simple, he said. Buy good ambulance chassis, or the under frames of the vehicles and the boxes that sit on them, and the department can refurbish the boxes and replace parts at significant savings.
“We take good care of our equipment,” Kodicek said. “We’ve continued with buying good, well-built ambulances, and we’ve gone with well-built remountable ambulances so we can continue with that process.”
Portage has 62 firefighters, with 48 of them trained as paramedics using four ambulances. The department usually runs two ambulances at all time, with an option to run a third unit, as necessary, Kodicek said.
In 2005, fire department officials decided it made more sense to buy remountable boxes that can be refurbished and put back on quality chassis.
It took time to cycle through the lifetime of each existing chassis and box, Kodicek said, but using remountable equipment, “it’s still not like having to spend to buy a whole new vehicle.”
Instead, the department solicited bids from companies that can install new floors, new lights or reupholster the boxes — the biggest part of any ambulance’s cost, Kodicek said.
The chassis usually have a fixed cost of about $80,000, depending on the number of features they have, and the city can’t control contractors’ labor costs, “but we’re saving a ton of money not having to rebuild a whole box, where they have to bend steel or aluminum or install whole new cabinets.”
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Michael Gonzalez is a freelance reporter for the Post-Tribune.