Whiteboard Notes
EMSAC Chiefs Session 09/24/2025

Brainstorming ideas and issues for future educational topics:

• High expenses- management of
• Recruitment for rural and urban EMS agencies
• Reimbursement- obtaining, managing etc…
• Treatment in place- reimbursement
• Utilization of AI to east work load
• Billing- done well- how to know if it is being done well
• Billing- how much to charge
• How to find a good collection agency
• How to find a good billing agency
• Retirement- long term retention
• Budgeting- how to basics and then more advanced classes to follow
• Long term capital planning
• How EMSAC funds classes to be offered
• How to increase EMSAC membership
• New manager membership program
•  Rural education – ALS
• Effective clinical improvement and growth
• Improve messaging- public education, EMSAC programs, what association is doing
• Health and Wellness- prioritizing meaningfully – actionable
• Funding readiness, how to sustain, improve, sources, generate
• IFT Safety, Education, how to adapt to increased volume and distances to ensure safety
• Quality Improvement – not just patient care but leadership, ops, “all things”
• Effective multiagency disaster response. EMS task force.  Integration of EMS as partners in disaster response and planning
• Equipment replacement – funding and budgeting
• Advocacy- how to
• Field training evaluation program, consistency, objectives, implementation plans
• EVOC training or similar
• Precepting- availability, how to find agencies that will participate
• Resiliency- training and methodology
• Retention- ability to and cost of not doing- rural and urban
• Effective shifts/schedules
• Leadership practices development
• Effective collaborative group- how to grow and develop- how to do at a statewide level
• HR Resources and managing HR issues
• Officer development programs – fire services does it well- not as developed for EMS side
• Succession planning-how to grow pipeline from within- desire to progress
• Fundamentals of EMS finance for new leaders
• Tips and tricks- what I wish I had known when I started
• Social media management, how to, what works, done well
• Data collection- what to collect, how to manage, store it, how to use it meaningfully, anticipate future needs
• Staff levels of activity, fatigue, downtime and how to measure and manage
• Staff morale what is fixable and how to manage
• Reducing errors-how to mitigate and mistake proof- how to identify
• Grant writing- how to find, how to write, apply
• Consolidation for economies of scale benefit, setting up ambulance authorities
• Discussion groups on EMS programs what does/does not work
• Introducing new tech or procedure and how to overcome resistance
• Professional ethics- legal issues, developing competence

Themes Identified:  Finance, Operations, Professional Development, Health and Safety, Finance, HR Issues, and Community and Government Relations

Health and Safety:

Ideas:

• Annual screening (start to finish)
  • NFPA 1582
  • Cancer Trust/Heart Trust- what is the EMS equivalent?
  • Peer Support
    • Resiliency training
    • Path 4 EMS
    • Adequate Staffing Model
    • Fatigue/ Stress Management
      • Scheduling
      • IFTs- prioritization of patient acuity, time of day (necessity) and impact on EMS provider safety

Health and Safety Educational Summary:

To train selected first responders to provide confidential, empathetic peer support through skills in active listening, crisis response and referral.  The program promotes mental health awareness, reduces stigma, and builds resilience within the first responder community.

• Equip first responders with practical strategies to manage fatigue and stress, emphasizing the essential roles of exercise and nutrition in maintaining performance and resilience.

Human Resources Theme

• Recruitment and retention and succession planning
  • Total compensation package, ties to strategic planning
  • HR Resources- HR department, external agency employers’ council
    • Managing HR issues Training
    • Legal Issues/Compliance
      • Policy manual HIPAA, FAMLI

HR Education Summary:

Recruitment, Retention, Succession Planning Goal: Empower EMS leaders with strategies to enhance R&R and succession planning by leveraging total rewards, aligning with strategic organizational goals and cultivate a resilient mission-driven culture.

• Define total rewards
• Align workforce planning with strategic plan
• Identify high performance individuals for development
• Employer branding for recruitment

Legal Issues Goal: Equip leaders and agency administrators with the knowledge and tools to recognize, navigate and mitigate common legal and compliance challenges in EMS

• HIPPA
• PCRs /documentation
• Vol v. paid staff (hours, benefits, FLSA)
• Harassment/ discrimination
• OSHA/Safety
• Agency policies
• When to involve legal counsel
• Hiring /firing

Financial Theme:

• Higher expenses
• Reimbursement
  • Treatment in place MIH Safety
  • Billing compare and ask
  • Collection Agencies
  • Budgeting
  • Grant writing
  • Funding provider grant
    • Equipment replacement
    • Consolidation
      • Community/ critical care paramedics
      • Federal funding to Colorado
        • Innovation and transformation fund
          • $50M per state x 5 years
          • Member education -budget to balance sheets
          • How to get to leaders/members/gov
          • Special Projects

Financial Action Plan:

• Go to State Gov and educate
• Het HB 1088 Passed or another bill to help EMS billing.  Getting ambulance bills to insurance companies before hospital bills
• Increase classes for leadership/billing
• Opportunity for group grants under provider or other grants
• Special project fund

Professional Development Theme:

• Career Roadmap
  • Clinical development
  • Line level officer/supervisor development
  • Leadership academy
    • Leadership practices development
    • Officer development programs
    • Succession planning
    • Tips and Tricks
    • Personal Growth Development
      • Individual development tools
        • Financial knowledge competency
        • Change influencing
        • Basic writing for business
        • Personal accountability and growth

Professional Development Education (Sean and Austin)

1)     Leadership Academy: Using national standards and best practices, partner with or develop educational programs to teach basic and advanced EMS leadership and management topics.

2)     Personal Growth: Build tools and resources for the EMS leaders to develop and expand their personal skill set using both EMS specific and non-EMS specific well rounded, management education.

From Richard Cornelius

Gabe suggested a title of: Navigating Your New Position as an EMS Leader

Goal: To provide professional development opportunities for new and emerging leaders in EMS.

Course Objectives:

1.           Prepare new and emerging leaders in EMS by providing the foundational personal growth development benchmarks critical to success, like time management principles and goal setting.

2.           Prepare new and emerging leaders in EMS by providing clinical development opportunities focused at the provider and supervisory levels which create the solid foundation needed to be successful as a leader.

3.           Prepare new and emerging leaders in EMS by providing the framework on leadership principles and best practices focused at the manager level which allow you to work with a diverse and multi-generational workforce.

Community and Government Relations Theme

• Government (state and local) and community education
  • What we do and how we do it
  • Who’s license matters/cost/commitment for education
  • Community support funding/ grant
  • Costs
    • Education
    • Rural v. urban
      • 911
      • IFTs
• Equipment replacement
• Safety
  • Patient
  • Staff
  • Improved messaging/communications
    • Consolidating economies of scale
    • New technology

Action Plan for Community and Gov’t Relations

• Advocacy to state and local
• Community education-events
  • What we do costs. Classes costs. V. reimbursement
  • Teach our own EMS groups what is happening at state level and locally
  • Safety education

Goals for Community and Gov’t Relations:

• Greate messaging and communication for our community and government on the EMTS system
• Once created, education on costs of staff, salary, IFTs, 911 etc…

Operations Theme:

• IFT
  • Staffing
  • Legal requirements
  • Payment/Contracting
  • Prioritization
  • Clinical Improvement
    • QI
    • Medical Direction
    • Deployment
      • Good BLS
      • ALS- where/when/how much/AMET?
      • Educational pipeline
      • Field Training
        • Onboarding/clinical/driving
        • Mutual Aid
          • EMT F (regional aid) shared services/IFT
          • Equipment /Vehicle
            • Selection-Replacement
            • Financing/ purchasing
            • Consolidated/Shared Services
              • Economies of scale
              • Authorities (Legal)
              • Independence v. Scale

Operations Theme Goals:

1)     Deployment- Educational Module

1. What do I need to have

                                                       i.      Team/BLS

1. Minimum Requirements
2. Mutual Aid
3. How do I pay for it

2)     Shared Services Education Module

1. What is economy of scale
2. How can I build it- tools
3. What the costs and benefits are
4. Pitfalls/issues

Top Topics By Theme Prioritized-Who Has Interest

Finance: (no one signed up)

1)     Mitigating Higher Expenses

2)     Reimbursement and Billing

3)     Member Education

HR:

1)     Recruitment and Retention Strategies (Austin)

2)     Legal and Compliance (Sean Caffrey)

Community and Government Relations: Heather Morris, Cherilyn Wittler and Austin Wingate

1)     Improved messaging and communication to key constituents and local/state gov.

2)     Costs- educating on how much EMS costs

Professional Development: Eric Murray, David Detray, Richard Cornelius, Mario Rodriguez

1)     Leadership themed content

2)     Training front line staff

Operations: Kim Shallenberger, Heather Morris, Reyna Martinez

1)     Managing deployment issues

2)     Consolidated and shared services- how to set up.

Meeting Evaluation Feedback (in room)

Positives: different perspectives shared, facilitation, nice growth opportunity for CMD, engagement on issues, identified many needs, process got us somewhere, kudos to group for high quality discussion and engagement.

Opportunities for Improvement:  break out rooms needed (virtual and physical), video feed showing online participants, name tags, need to take all this forward and act on it, need a shared place to find documents other than emails, can we bring outside expertise or programs in, need an online group to solicit info/share info like “Knowledge Net”