OBSERVER Photo by Gregory Bacon Emergency Medical Services Director Noel Guttman speaks at the Audit and Control Committee meeting.

Chautauqua County fire departments with ambulances that don’t bill for insurance or have an agreement with the county for billing will tentatively be charged $250 per Advanced Life Support call that involves mutual aid from the county’s Emergency Medical Services.

The agreement is expected to be approved later this month.

Earlier this year, Noel Guttman, Chautauqua County Director of Emergency Medical Services, shared there was a change in the state law regarding billing for emergency medical services.

The new legislation states an ambulance service which does not issue a bill for its services and which requests an ALS intercept shall pay the ambulance service providing the ALS intercept.

The legislation went into effect July 8. The county chose to wait until now because they have the option to back bill up to 90 days. That gave the county until Oct. 6 before it has to start billing fire departments for ALS support calls.

During Thursday’s Audit and Control Committee meeting, Guttman announced the rate of $250. He said the rate was calculated with the help of members of the Fire Advisory Board, EMS Council, and Fire Chiefs Association.

There are 42 fire departments in the county, 35 which have ambulance services. Guttman said he thinks “only one or two” will be billed this $250 rate. Most of them have already either decided to become a billing entity or have the county take over its billing.

He added that some are still in the process of deciding but there are one or two that said they want to take a “wait and see” position to see how things work out.

Guttman did not identify what departments they were.

Legislator Tom Harmon, R-Silver Creek, asked Guttman if he thinks $250 is enough, which Guttman said yes, especially since he thinks it will be very rare that they have to bill a fire department.

Legislator Dan Pavlock, R-Sinclairville, noted that fire departments have over the years struggled financially and asked Guttman if those that do billing on their own or through the county will be helped with this new state law.

“That was the intent of the law when it was passed, was to provide departments the ability to recover costs. … I think that’s the intent and hopefully that’s the way it works,” Guttman responded.

Guttman added that New York was the last state in the nation to enact this type of legislation. “I think it’s a proven record across the country that fire departments have the ability to be profitable through insurance to recover their costs,” he said.

The full legislature will vote Wednesday to finalize the $250 rate.