Matlacha/Pine Island Fire Control District issues end of year report
According to Assistant Fire Chiefs Matt Davis and Cody Allen of the Matlacha/Pine Island Fire Control District, department transparency is a major priority.
The mission statement for each year has now been changed to a vision statement, said Davis. The takeaway from this year’s end of the year report, he said, is the push for Advanced Life Support and EMS services.
In addition to expanding the department to offer these services, there were seven new hires last year and two already this year, with one more coming, to replace three retirees.
“We were up 15 percent in our calls last year. We almost hit 2,000 calls for the first time ever — that sounds really busy, but this year we’re surpassing that already. Last year, our busiest month was 190 calls, we already had 220 in January,” Davis said.
The projected calls for the year are approximately 2,500 calls, he said. Last year Lee Flight was used 50 times, and has already been used over 20 times in 2022, with a projected usage rate of over 100 by the end of the year.
Island population growth is the major reason for the increased volume of calls, Davis said, comparing 1,210 medical calls made to the department in 2019 to the 1,397 calls made in 2021.
“Every part of our job has become more. More vehicle accidents, more medical calls, more structure fires and more brush fires — everything’s more. We’re already doing more this year than we’ve done in the last three years,” Davis said.
Although things typically slow down as the busy season comes to a close, Davis said things are not really slowing down this year. The average, per month, was 163 calls last year, with a daily average of 5.4 calls, with an on-scene response time, under 7 minutes per call, 86 percent of the time.
“In 2021 we started our progression to get into ALS, which is Advanced Life Support, to increase our capabilities for medical calls, which are the bulk of the calls that we run. We had six employees start paramedic school back in 2020, and they are set to graduate this year. We’ve increased our hands-on training to simulate a lot more of the medical aspects of calls and we’ve started making purchases to help with that training,” Allen said.
The hope, he said, is that by the end of 2022, the department will be ALS non-transport capable, enabling far more medical care. New cardiac monitors have been purchased, and a credentialing program has been put into place to ensure ALS care state standards are being met.
Since COVID-19 the department has acted in accordance with both CDC and Lee County EMS guidelines, including PPE standards.
“Our staff has done an incredible job at making sure that they as well as the patients have remained as safe as possible,” Allen said.
For a complete end of the year report on the department, please visit Station 1 for a hard copy 5700 Pine Island Road, Bokeelia, FL 33922, or visit Pineisland fire.org
To reach PAULETTE LeBLANC / pleblanc@breezenewspapers.com, please email