Gainesville Fire Rescue reports rising calls, outlines opioid settlement spending and one-year results for medication-assisted treatment program

Gainesville Fire Rescue presented its second-quarter 2025 report Tuesday to the Gainesville City Commission, detailing operational metrics, training and equipment updates, and use of opioid-abatement funds to sustain a medication-assisted treatment program.

Assistant Chief Adam Hinton said GFR ran 7,106 calls in the quarter, with 65% of calls categorized as EMS. “Our turnout time average department‑wide was 46 seconds,” Hinton said, adding that travel time averaged 5 minutes, 5 seconds—above the national standard of four minutes. Hinton described station-planning work including a proposed Station 9 site and relocation options for Station 3 tied to an Eighth Avenue/Waldo Road project.

Brandy Stone, GFR director of community health initiatives, outlined how national opioid‑abatement settlement funding is being used locally. “This quarter we trained all of Parks, Recreation and Cultural Affairs staff on how to administer Narcan and identify overdoses,” Stone said. She told commissioners GFR has submitted a CORE (Coordinated Opioid Recovery Effort) request for state fiscal 2026 to continue the MAT program after legislative appropriations ended.

Stone gave the MAT program’s first-year metrics: 96 referrals from 16 sources produced about a 49% enrollment rate; 40 of 46 individuals who enrolled completed the program as GFR defines graduation (connection to outpatient care, a prescription for opioid-use treatment, or referral to another provider). The program also provides “gap” services when patients have short interruptions between prescriptions; Stone said GFR delivered 27 gap‑service instances to 17 patients since August 2024.

GFR’s community resource paramedicine program reported growth: 131 referrals for the quarter, a 54% increase from the prior quarter, and 167 hours of direct patient care (a 61% increase). Stone said team members continue to coordinate encampment referrals and support Grace Marketplace bed placements.

Britney Coleman, program manager for Impact GMV (GFR’s gun-violence intervention initiative), reviewed outreach and staff growth including a newly city‑employed violence-interruption team (one coordinator and three intervention specialists) and a planned Impact GMV open house June 11. “Impact GMV is our framework,” Coleman said. “It is our framework for how we have put together and conceptualized our work.” She described funding and neighborhood partnerships supporting violence‑prevention programs.

Commissioners praised the health and public-safety work. Commissioner Eastman said the MAT program’s one-year results were “tremendous.” Stone and Coleman said staff will distribute a more detailed annual report on the MAT program and continue reporting community-health-plan progress to the commission.

What’s next: GFR will continue to pursue CORE funding to sustain MAT services, move forward with station site planning and repairs (Station 5 crews were temporarily relocated while facilities treat an infestation), and bring fuller annual reports on MAT and community-health initiatives to the commission.