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Kershaw County EMS director: call volume rose to about 11,000 last year; council hears gaps in rural coverage
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Summary
Emergency Services Director Will Glover told the county council that annual EMS calls rose from about 10,000 to 11,000, with 143 calls last year taking more than 30 minutes to reach patients. Councilmembers pressed staff on coverage gaps and asked about deployable medical units and grant opportunities.
Emergency Services Director Will Glover told the Kershaw County Council on March 10 that EMS call volume increased to roughly 11,000 calls last year, up from about 10,000 the previous year, and that the service recorded 143 calls with response times greater than 30 minutes and 13 calls over 45 minutes.
The presentation, delivered after the county administrator introduced a condensed version of a finance‑committee briefing, showed that population growth along the Highway 1 corridor corresponded with higher call volumes in the Elgin, Lugoff and Camden districts. Glover said rural districts continue to have the longest average response times and attributed some extended times to distance and to safety staging when scenes are not secure.
"Last year we ran about 10,000, bumping up to 11,000. Out of those, we had 143 calls that we had a greater than 30‑minute response time to," Glover said during his presentation.
Councilmembers asked follow‑up questions about historic coverage gaps and specific units. Councilmember Tucker asked about the status of Medic 5 (the Bethune station) and whether coverage problems from prior years had been reduced. Glover said Medic 5 had previously been shut down for prolonged periods — 85 days in 2023 — but that the county had reduced those interruptions substantially (to a few hours in 2025) and was working to keep that unit staffed and available.
Councilmember Brazel asked whether the county had explored mobile or deployable medical units as a stopgap for rural communities. The administrator said staff had received information about a deployable unit with a roughly $185,000 price tag and would convene a short meeting to evaluate feasibility and potential grant funding; Brazel noted some grant programs with near deadlines that could be used to help purchase such equipment.
The presentation included maps and district‑level heat maps of calls and permits; Glover said the county is continuing a deeper analysis of long response events to identify whether distance, staging for safety, or other factors are the primary causes.
No vote was required; the council asked staff to share the slides with members and to follow up on potential deployable‑unit options and grant opportunities.
