Regionalizing first responders: Is it inevitable?

With two Vineyard chiefs — Oak Bluffs Fire Chief Nelson Wirtz and Edgartown Police Chief Bruce McNamee — retiring in the next few months, the idea of regionalizing first-responder departments on the Island has resurfaced. 

The discussion was triggered in Oak Bluffs, where an advisory board is recommending the town explore the idea of sharing the fire chief position, possibly with Tisbury, in an effort to not just save taxpayers money, but to help in a candidate search.

Regionalizing fire and police departments has become a more frequent discussion in recent years on the Island. Some in the community see the word “regionalize” as taboo, while others see the potential to not only save taxpayer money, but to make departments more efficient. 

The discussion has gained urgency, with town officials saying that it has become harder and harder to find housing for staff, from the top of first-responder departments down to new hires and volunteers who provide emergency services.

“It’s difficult to fill almost any position on the Island,” said Brian Smith, chair of the Oak Bluffs personnel board. 

Smith was a part of the initial discussions underway in Oak Bluffs to look at merging with another fire department. 

Pay for fire or police chief can reach six figures (Wirtz’s salary in Oak Bluffs is now just over $170,000), so Smith said it can be cost-effective to regionalize the chief positions. And he advocates for having the discussions beyond just Tisbury and Oak Bluffs, and to potentially look at an Island-wide approach to hiring chiefs, noting it would be easier to search for one fire chief than six. 

“We need to start a more serious discussion than what’s been happening these past decades,” Smith said.

During the Oak Bluffs select board meeting on August 13, town officials were in favor of taking the opportunity to explore developing a framework with other Island towns. Part of the exploration would include answering lingering questions, like which town pays for what, and how much, which board the chief would answer to, and for which towns it would make sense to share a chief. 

The town is planning to consult with Wirtz and Oak Bluffs Deputy Fire Chief Stephen Foster. 

During a meeting on August 27, the select board voted to proceed with hiring a new fire chief while also pursuing talks with Tisbury about potentially regionalizing different departments, like the fire department or the shellfish department. The board also noted regionalizing a department could take years to accomplish.

Gail Barmakian, Oak Bluffs select board chair, challenged the notion that regionalization leads to saving money. She underscored that the issue needed a study before implementation. 

There have been past efforts to regionalize emergency departments as a means to share resources and save money. Up-Island towns have entertained a failed proposition to establish a tri-town fire department, and Tisbury considered regionalizing its EMS department with another town when ambulance director Tracey Jones announced her retirement in 2022. 

As for the police force, former Tisbury finance committee member Dan Seidman said there was a missed opportunity for towns to pursue regionalization when three chiefs retired in rapid succession some years ago. The retirements led to three new police chiefs being minted in 2018 for Tisbury, Edgartown, and West Tisbury. 

A “big believer of regionalization,” Seidman said, “It’s the only way they’re going to be able to manage the Island.” 

In Tisbury, where Fire Chief Greg Leland has been placed on leave for unspecified reasons, town officials are open to the regionalization discussion. 

“Tisbury is very interested in exploring opportunities for shared services with towns on the Island,” Jay Grande, Tisbury town administrator, said. Grande pointed out that Tisbury already has some joint efforts with Oak Bluffs, such as developing a monitoring system for short-term rentals. 

Tisbury treasurer Jon Snyder echoed the sentiment that how to split costs for salaries and benefits would be a major consideration. But Snyder said it would be difficult to say exactly how different elements would influence the regional agreement. He said a framework has to be established for a shared chief. 

“The financial details are one of many factors to be considered,” Snyder said. 

Regionalization on the Island is already common. The budget of the largest school on the Island, Martha’s Vineyard Regional High School, is shared by all six towns. There’s also the regional emergency communications center housed by the Dukes County Sheriff’s Office. 

And among various on-Island emergency departments, there is one municipal first-responder service that operates on a regional basis: Tri-Town Ambulance, which serves West Tisbury, Chilmark, and Aquinnah. 

Ben Retmier, chief of Tri-Town Ambulance, said the up-Island model was developed more than 40 years ago to create a cost-effective ambulance service. Although initially a voluntary force, the service was gradually professionalized, and by 2010 was run by full-time EMTs, with some volunteers. 

Three-fourths of the ambulance service’s funding is shared evenly among the three up-Island towns, and the remaining quarter is split based on the previous year’s call volume of each town. This formula was established in 2021. “It seems to have been working for the past few years,” Retmier said. 

Still, there are some challenges that come with the system. Retmier said if his department wants to consider policy changes, or even hire an additional employee, he needs to go before all three up-Island select boards and finance committees. “It’s a little nerve-wracking every budget season,” Retmier said. 

Although all three towns have a say in Tri-Town Ambulance, Chilmark acts as the “governing body,” so the town’s bylaws are followed for personnel matters, Retmier said. Still, he said, the overall shared structure doesn’t really affect daily operations. 

Some towns are more wary of regionalization. Edgartown town administrator James Hagerty said his town, which he said is fully staffed for public safety chiefs and personnel, isn’t proactively pursuing regionalization. “If there’s a worthwhile discussion, it’ll always be entertained,” he said.

If it were considered, Hagerty said, “equity is an important factor,” and the financial burden cannot fall too heavily on Edgartown, as some regional initiatives he believes have.

“Currently, we shoulder 40 percent of the expenses for the [Martha’s Vineyard Commission], 40 percent for the county, and 33 percent for health and human services programs, despite not having a population proportionate to these contributions,” he said. “Under the current framework, regionalization offers limited cost savings for Edgartown, and does not present a sound business decision.”

However, Hagerty said there are some “lower-hanging fruit” for regionalization to consider, such as the boards of health or animal control officers, before a major department like police or fire gets the change. He said this would also allow towns to see the pros and cons of sharing once-separate services between municipalities.

If Island towns do pursue regionalizing police and fire departments — which would require town meeting votes — some offer a warning that it may be difficult to figure out the details. Wirtz told The Times regionalizing an emergency department can be successful, but without proper preparation it could become a “disaster.” 

“There are circumstances where it works, but it is complicated particularly because you’re dealing with different tax bases, sometimes even different town bylaws and expectations,” Wirtz said. “There has to be an awful lot of discussion and agreement between the governments.” 

Wirtz also recommends regionalizing the department, and not just the chief position. He said that it would be very difficult to run two different departments with separate operating guidelines, even if they share the same mission. 

Wirtz also said there is reluctance from some Island officials toward regionalization because it means losing some autonomy over the emergency department. 

Based on conversations Retmier has had with other Island chiefs, he said there is a hesitancy toward regionalization over uncertainties regarding how each department would need to change, and how the operations would be funded. But the two chiefs were not against the concept of regionalization. 

Retmier believes staffing may be what pushes departments toward regionalization to shore up numbers, especially departments that rely on volunteers. For EMTs, Retmier said, requirements to maintain certifications have become more stringent over the decades, and it’s hard for some volunteers to leave at the drop of a hat during emergencies, particularly since many are working multiple jobs and dealing with the “Island shuffle,” searching for housing. 

There has also been a push among the Vineyard fire departments toward professionalization, citing struggles in recruiting a volunteer firefighting force. 

“We kind of know it’s potentially coming,” Retmier said of regionalization. “We don’t know when or how it will look, but we know it will be coming sooner rather than later.”