The Alexandria Fire Department wants to respond to medical and other emergencies outside of city limits.
DeKalb County E-911 Director Brad Mullinax said AFD has requested to have its own response tone for emergencies in their area.
“Basically what they’re doing is offering the service free of charge to the county residents as an automatic-aid type of response,” Mullinax said. “What they were requesting to do was seek permission from the county to go out into the country boundaries outside of the town of Alexandria, which is their primary response area, in order to provide those EMS, medical-type services.”
In the proposal, AFD personnel would provide first-responder services during medical emergencies within a five-mile radius of Alexandria city limits. Those services would be provided until DeKalb County EMS officials could arrive on-scene.
Mullinax said the proposal could be beneficial to those who live just outside Alexandria.
“If I was a resident in the town of Alexandria and as far away as the local EMS station is, the primary EMS station,” Mullinax said, “I think the town of Alexandria and DeKalb County residents are going to benefit from this because they’re going to have responders local to the area.”
Mullinax said AFD would enter into an automatic aid agreement with DeKalb County EMS in order to provide the service. Currently, AFD has a similar agreement with the DeKalb County Fire Department.
“That was done probably about a year and a half, two years ago,” Mullinax said. “They actually fall under DeKalb County EMS, but the fact that they’re wanting to take their city-owned equipment into the county, we felt it was best to have an automatic aid agreement to cover everybody from a liability perspective.”
The proposal was first approved by the Alexandria Board of Aldermen during their December meeting. DeKalb County Executive Tim Stribling presented the idea before the county commission during Monday’s meeting.
County officials determined they would meet with Alexandria city officials to discuss details of the proposal before finalizing an agreement.