The Village of Great Neck Estates Board of Trustees approved the 2011 Great Neck Vigilant Fire Company contract last week. The $723,000 contract represents a 6.8 percent increase over 2010.
The village also passed a motion to sign Vigilant’s 2009 and 2010 contracts, which requires the village to retroactively pay Vigilant $48,000.
Village of Great Neck Estates Mayor David Fox said the village still believes Vigilant needs to improve its billing methods, but that the fire company does a “remarkable” job.
“I have to make it perfectly clear that at no time has this or any previous administration ever questioned the actions or capability that Vigilant has put forth for this entire Peninsula,” Fox said. “This is a fiscal and financial issue, and should not be put in terms of personal issues or personal capabilities.”
As Fox made the motion to sign the contracts, he said a letter would be sent to Vigilant asking then to meet certain “caveats” in the next contract.
The biggest “caveat” was finding a way for Vigilant to bill residents’ insurance companies for ambulance calls. As a volunteer fire and ambulance service, state law prohibits Vigilant from billing for service.
Fox said that in other parts of the county, municipalities charge insurance companies when a resident calls for ambulance assistance.
A Nassau County ambulance costs $999 for life support, $1,199 for advanced life support I and $1,249 for advanced life support II, with an additional charge of $15 per mile. That money is collected by the county, whereas Vigilant provides their ambulance service for free to the residents as part of the overall protection plan. It does not charge insurance companies for reimbursement fees.
“It just seems ludicrous that we have abandoned an opportunity to collect money, and let the insurance companies keep that money in the form of premiums,” Fox said. “We aren’t demanding anything at present, and we aren’t trying to make money off this. If Vigilant was allowed to charge insurance companies for ambulance calls, then that money could be passed onto our taxpayers to save them money.”
Vigilant indicated that the village’s rate will go down by 5 percent next year, remain flat the year after that, and drop 3 percent the following year.
“We’ve developed a five-year budget to try to really narrow down what the outlook looks like,” Weiss said in a previous statement. “We are not seeing any major increases. A lot of our loan payments finished last year and that will effect our debt service coming down. We come up with a budget every year taking into consideration the monies needed to run the fire department. No one is making money. We make it as fair as a budget as we can, and hold costs as best we can.”
Fox said the new budget showed that Vigilant is trying to rein in costs, but he said “we aren’t doing our job” if the village does not fight for that fiscal accountability.
“We live in a time of financial crisis, and we have to understand we’re all in this together,” Fox said. “It’s like separate fingers on a hand, if one doesn’t work then the entire hand doesn’t work.”
Currently the Villages of Kings Point, Great Neck, Saddle Rock, Town of North Hempstead have signed a Vigilant 2011 contract. The contract has not yet been approved in the villages of Great Neck Plaza and Kensington.
Volunteers provide ambulance service to every village north of the Long Island Rail Road tracks, but only provide fire protection to the villages of Great Neck Estates, Great Neck Plaza and Kensington.
The budget has historically been paid by a 70/30 split between fire and ambulance.
Three years ago, Vigilant’s accountant recommended a 62-38 split, which provoked resistance to the old formula from Great Neck Estates, Great Neck Plaza and Kensington. A study from the Town of North Hempstead last year recommended a 62-38 split.
In 2009, every village signed a contract with Vigilant with the understanding that in 2010 the proportion of fire and ambulance would change to 62-38. The modification would have cost the northern villages – those without fire protection – more for ambulance service.
When northern villages signed a 2010 contract with the original 70-30 arrangement, Kensington signed reluctantly. Great Neck Plaza refused, while Great Neck Estates signed a 62-38 contract.
Great Neck mayors held a closed meeting mid-June but were not able to agree on a contract. The lack of progress prompted Vigilant officials to write and send out a contract with a sign by date, using the 70-30 split.
