Council holds second reading on EMS-billing ordinance that would let billing contractor set annual fees

Urbana City Council held a public hearing and completed a second reading Tuesday on Ordinance 46 15-25, which would amend Chapter 141 of the codified ordinances to revise indemnity language for emergency medical technicians (EMTs) and replace a static EMS-fee method with a dynamic, annually adjusted fee structure.

City staff and the fire chief told the council the current fee formula limited revenue recovery and that the updated language would allow the city’s billing contractor to update fees each year to match contractual allowances from insurers. “With these changes, we anticipate about a 10 to 15% increase in billing revenue within a year,” the presenter said during the public hearing.

The ordinance would remove a provision in Section 141.03 the presenter said was outdated and not applicable to the city’s emergency services and would replace the percentage-based fee approach in Section 141.04 (last revised 2019) with a composite, dynamic fee methodology recommended by the city’s new billing vendor, Ohio Billing. Staff also proposed expanding the list of billable fire and rescue services and routing delinquent nonresident accounts to the state attorney general’s collections unit.

Council members asked how the projected revenue increase would be recorded. A councilmember asked whether an additional $500,000 would go into a department line item or to the general fund; staff clarified the 10–15% projection was a percent increase on current billing revenue (about $500,000 in total collections today), not a guaranteed $500,000 new appropriation. The presenter said current ambulance receipts are recorded to the general fund.

The city’s law director and staff answered procedural questions but the council did not take a final vote on adoption Tuesday. The item was advanced through its required public hearing and received a second reading; further action is expected at a later meeting.

If adopted, the ordinance would: empower the city’s chosen billing contractor to recommend an annual fee schedule tied to insurers’ contractual adjustments, expand billable fire-rescue services, and add a process for sending delinquent nonresident accounts for external collection. The ordinance number discussed at the meeting is 46 15-25 and a public hearing was held prior to the second reading.

Council members and staff said the change is meant to maximize reimbursements while maintaining collection ratios; no changes to indemnity standards beyond the removal of the cited subsection were described in detail at the hearing. The council will consider final action at a future meeting when staff can provide ordinance final wording and any budgetary impacts.Section 1: Votes & procedural status — public hearing held; second reading completed; no final adoption vote taken Tuesday.

Section 2: What’s next — staff said it will present the final ordinance language for a future council vote and provide budget/accounting details tied to ambulance revenues and general-fund accounting.