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Fairfield County officials weigh ambulance remounts to save six‑figure sums amid long delivery timelines
Summary
County EMS told council that new ambulances can take 28–36 months to deliver and that remounting existing boxes could save more than $125,000 per unit; council asked staff to refine cost comparisons and consider transferring surplus supervisor vehicles to local rescue squads.
Fairfield County’s budget work session on June 11 turned to a detailed review of the emergency medical services fleet, where county EMS staff urged a mix of replacement and remounting strategies to control costs and reduce lead times.
"To replace that particular type of vehicle, it would have been $270,000...We could take those savings from that vehicle and apply it to this new vehicle and save the county over $125,000," Tim, a Fairfield County EMS official, told council members while explaining options to remount ambulance modules to new chassis rather than ordering full new builds.
Tim said the county currently fields eight ambulances but would count only three as frontline units because most vehicles exceed a high-mileage threshold; he said delivery timelines for new ambulances are lengthy (about 28–36 months), which has pushed the department to consider remounting and remanufacture as a near-term strategy. He also described a recent remount that saved the county a substantial amount and said that remounting can shorten lead time to about nine months.
Council members asked for clearer line-item budgeting for capital versus vehicle-lease items and whether surplus supervisor or administrative vehicles could be transferred to rescue squads that lack reliable transport. "We would completely be open to making sure we could transfer that vehicle over to them," Tim said of potential surplus units.
Mr. Carpenter said staff will continue to refine estimates and prepare motions for third reading so council can weigh formal trade-offs between buying new vehicles, remounting, or remount-plus-parts strategies.
Next steps: Staff will provide itemized capital and vehicle-lease estimates and firm quotes for new-build versus remount options ahead of the county’s third-reading budget vote.
