Bruce County council will not be merging its paramedic service with Grey County.
The two counties had commissioned a study into the possibility of sharing a paramedic service, but a consultant found a merger was unlikely to save money for either county, and in fact might increase Bruce County's paramedic budget by as much as $450,000.
Bruce County's Acting Director of Emergency Services Ray Lux says bringing Bruce County's collective agreement in line with Grey County's is where the additional costs would have come in, specifically shift premiums and training wages.
Lux says the report did identify two areas where Bruce County could save some money, including ambulance maintenance and shared training with Grey County and other jurisdictions. He says they currently use an outside service centre for their ambulance maintenance, while Grey County fixes their ambulance in-house, and that's something they will investigate to see if it could save taxpayer dollars.
Saugeen Shores Mayor Mike Smith is chair of the paramedic services committee and says any talk of a merger is dead and they will continue to operate Bruce County Paramedic Services separate from Grey County. He adds that the review was worthwhile, and it gave them an independent opinion that showed both counties run their paramedic services efficiently.
While mergers typically bring about cost savings, Smith says that would not have been the case.
"Instinctively, you think that you might find [cost savings], but when we went all through, I think what it said to us is that is that we have a very efficient service," says Smith. "We had staff look at it, and then we had an outside consultant look at it and they both came to the same conclusion, that both services are operated very well."
