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Potential EBR/EMS merger still in wait-and-see mode after court hearing Friday
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BATON ROUGE — The potential merger between the Baton Rouge Fire Department and East Baton Rouge EMS is still in wait-and-see mode after a court hearing Thursday. Questions still arise over whether the proposed merger is legal under the city-parish charter, also known as the plan of government.
19th JDC judge Ron Johnson says there is no reason why all of this can't be resolved in six months. He gave the attorneys representing both sides, the Baton Rouge Municipal Fire and Police Service Board and the East Baton Rouge EMS Paramedic Association, a 90-day discovery process.
"The parties get information about different things that are going on in the case. In this particular case, I don't know that it's a whole lot of information that's not already known to the public," The Board's attorney Joshua Dara said.
This week, the board voted to expand Baton Rouge Fire Chief Michael Kimble's job description. Mayor-President Sid Edwards told WBRZ on Tuesday that if they decided to merge the programs, Kimble would oversee EMS.
Dara says this vote came after a temporary restraining order against the board, preventing them from moving forward with a vote, was dissolved.
"We got to court on the 27th, of course, there was a request for more time to address an exception that was filed by the board, an exception is not different than an objection, regarding subject matter jurisdiction, essentially we were saying, look, you can't stop something that's already occurred, that is impossible," Dara said.
Despite that, a judge still must consider whether, under the home-rule charter, which outlines how the city-parish operates, if the head of a department that works for the city of Baton Rouge can oversee employees who work parish-wide.
"Our position is that under the current plan of government, they cannot do that because the city fire department is limited to fire protection, number one, and only within the city. EMS, you know, the citizens have voted in a millage and it's a parish-wide service," EMS Paramedic's attorney Robert Aguiluz.
Aguiluz says that the only way a home-rule charter can be changed is if a change is proposed and then allowed to be voted on by the people.
"The administration and the fire department keep referring to this as a merger, but there's no provision for merger, they're under two separate civil service systems, and so what would actually have to happen, is the department of Emergency Medical Services would cease to exist, and then they will create a seperate division under the fire department," Aguiluz said.
The EBR Paramedics Association president, Janice Willard, told WBRZ that the outcome of Friday's hearing was pretty good in their favor."
"The association would like to keep EMS autonomous, and we are our own department, as opposed to becoming a division under the fire department," Willard said.
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