Prosper approves Emergifyr contract to bill insurers for fire responses and updates town code to add mitigation rates

The Prosper Town Council unanimously approved June 10 a professional services agreement with Emergifyr LLC to implement a program for charging mitigation rates to commercial insurance policies for emergency and non-emergency responses by Prosper Fire Rescue. Council also adopted an ordinance amending Chapter 5.05 of the town code to repeal the prior hazardous materials incident response article and add a new Article 5.05 establishing fire department mitigation rates in Appendix A of the fee schedule.

Chief Blassingame presented the proposal and described how Emergifyr's model operates: the vendor pursues reimbursement from commercial insurance policies (including standard auto and homeowner insurers) and remits collections to the town after taking a fee (the contract rate disclosed at the meeting was 15% of collections). The vendor integrates with the town's EMS billing vendor (Emergicon) and can pull incident data from Prosper's systems; firefighters will need to capture some additional information on-scene to support billing. The chief and staff emphasized that the vendor invoices insurers, not individual residents; if insurers do not pay, the town typically writes the amount off after collection attempts, similar to EMS billing practices.

Chief Blassingame provided examples of recovered revenue from other jurisdictions and noted collection outcomes vary widely; past instances elsewhere ranged from tens of thousands up to six-figure recoveries on a single large commercial fire. Collected funds will be deposited to the town's charges-for-service account (the same fund used for EMS collections). Council discussion clarified that Emergifyr focuses on commercial and third-party insurer claims and that the 15% fee applies to the vendor's collections. The council also adopted a companion ordinance (Item 14) to add the mitigation fee schedule to the town code and remove the older hazardous-materials fee article so that Emergifyr can bill under town authority.

The motions: council approved the professional services agreement (Item 13) and the ordinance amending Chapter 5.05 (Item 14). Both motions passed unanimously. The Item 13 motion was moved and seconded from the dais (motion wording in the record: to approve an amendment to a professional services agreement between Emergifyr LLC and the Town of Prosper to implement a program to charge mitigation rates). The Item 14 ordinance motion was also moved and seconded and passed unanimously.

Why it matters: the program is intended to recover costs for fire response (hazmat incidents, structure fires, vehicle incidents and other billable responses) from liable commercial insurers, reducing pressure on general revenues. The vendor fee and the town's collection practices will determine net revenue; council retained oversight and placed the billing authority in code.

What remains: staff will implement integration with existing billing systems, provide training to crews on data collection on-scene, and report back on collections and usage of recovered funds.