GIRARD — Girard council has given final approval to pursue billing non-residents for mutual aid ambulance service.

After one year of restored ambulance service to the city, officials are planning to begin charging outside transports because of an increase in mutual aid calls the fire department has been making to neighboring communities. Council voted 7-0 at their meeting Monday to begin billing for mutual aid.

Fire Chief Jim Petruzzi previously told officials that since the ambulance service was brought back in late June 2024, there have been 1,524 calls, with 936 being ambulance transports for both Girard residents and nonresidents.

Petruzzi said there were 267 mutual aid calls from June 2024 to May 2025, with Liberty needing mutual aid 195 times; McDonald, 50; Weathersfield, 13; Hubbard, five; Niles, two; and Youngstown and Brookfield, one each. He said 42 of the mutual aid calls ended en route.

Petruzzi said of the mutual aid calls, 174 were emergency medical calls, 29 were for fires and 21 were for vehicle crashes.

He said Girard did receive mutual aid from other fire departments 27 times, with 10 being EMS responses, three transports when the department was on other calls at the same time, 11 fire responses and two vehicle crashes. One was canceled en route.

Councilman Thomas Grumley, D-4th Ward, said the fire department has become almost a mutual aid ambulance service and the number of calls outside of Girard — mostly to Liberty — warrants hard billing for the transport service.

Grumley said previously there are costs for the ambulance service, which was brought back for Girard residents, such as wear and tear of the ambulance and equipment. Officials have said it is one thing to help neighboring communities, but the high mutual aid numbers justify outside billing because it can hurt the city when it has to replace vehicles or make repairs.

Petruzzi said nonresidents have been sent a bill, and while some pay it, there are others who do not and it is written off. He said they will begin billing to see what insurance covers and then send the remaining amount to collections.

CITY FINANCES

In other business, Auditor Julie Coggins said she is monitoring the water and sewer funds. She said she is seeing how to best cut expenses from the water fund and reallocate some of the money from the general fund and not the water fund.

Coggins said water expenses from Youngstown, Niles and Trumbull County are a significant expense, draining resources from the water fund.

“The water fund has been a problem. There are loans that will need to be repaid in 2026 for water projects,” she said.

Councilman John Moliterno, D-at Large, said no one wants to raise water rates.

Coggins said she is also watching the sewer fund.

As for speed camera revenue, she said year-to-date collections are at $405,697, which is $30,000 less than last year at this time.

Coggins said Girard is paying the costs for the speed camera ticket process in Girard Municipal Court with no additional funds from Liberty or Vienna, which were prohibited from using speed cameras as of July 1.

To support the garbage fund, Coggins mentioned that 4% of the city’s income tax revenue will be placed in that fund.