Crozer provides EMS service for more than a dozen Delco municipalities and they’re scrambling for solutions post-closure

Delaware County municipalities that have long relied on Crozer Health System for EMS services are bracing for longer wait times and rushing to come up with answers to fill the gaps the health system’s looming closure will leave behind.

For decades Crozer has provided some level of essentially free EMS support to more than a dozen Delaware County municipalities, including Upper Darby and Chester.

In a statement Tuesday, Chester Mayor Stefan Roots said that once Crozer closes, the hospital will no longer dispatch emergency vehicles. Ambulances will still go to Chester and other communities that rely on Crozer, but there will be fewer emergency vehicles in the county, and as a result wait times will be longer.

“It’s a wide-open situation right now, very fluid — very scary, too,” Roots said in an interview, noting that seconds of delay by first responders in some cases can mean the difference between life and death.

However, Roots said, municipalities had little ability to solidify plans for continued EMS service until Crozer’s owner, Prospect Medical Holdings, filed official closure plans on Monday in bankruptcy court.

Beginning Wednesday morning, ambulances will be diverted from bringing patients to Crozer-Chester Medical Center in Upland and Taylor Hospital in Ridley Park.

The closure process will allow for a gradual winding down of services provided by Crozer Health, Delaware County’s largest health system. EMS services will not fully terminate until May 2 and could extend longer under procedures approved Tuesday by a bankruptcy judge in Texas.

The 911 dispatch, which is run by Delaware County, will remain operational and ambulances will continue to travel to areas that currently rely on Crozer. But it will be up to the individual municipalities to purchase or contract for additional emergency vehicles and staffing.

Some municipalities, including Swarthmore, already have their own EMS services that they share with neighboring municipalities. But Crozer’s closure will effectively kneecap the EMS capacity in large parts of Delaware County, leaving municipalities that had relied on their services scrambling to come up with a solution they had not allocated money for.

“This is expensive and not something that was budgeted for. We are hopeful that the state and county will help with funding to allow for the services to proceed uninterrupted not just in Aston but throughout Delaware County,” said Joe McGinn, an Aston Township supervisor.

Even as Chester faces bankruptcy, Roots said the city would make sacrifices in its budget to ensure there are emergency vehicles available.

Many local officials across Delaware County are discussing combining resources to sign new contracts for EMS services or to fund local authorities, though the exact timeline and format of those partnerships is unclear.

Such partnerships are incentivized because ambulances owned by specific townships or boroughs are still obligated to take calls in neighboring communities if needed. In an interview Monday, Delaware County Council Chair Monica Taylor said the county has been meeting with municipalities and helping to coordinate as they begin to make their own arrangements for EMS services.

In a statement Monday, Upper Darby Mayor Ed Brown called for a collaborative response and said he had directed the township’s top administrator to pursue that solution.

“We believe the long-term solution for sustainable, high-quality EMS service lies in a regional approach among neighboring Delaware County communities,” Brown said in a statement. He did not elaborate on which communities Upper Darby had been in contact with or what that partnership would look like.

In a presentation last month, Upper Darby officials said the township was the largest user of EMS services in Delaware County, accounting for more than 13,000 calls annually. Crandall Jones, the township’s chief administrative officer, said conversations about partnerships were ongoing but had been difficult because of politics among communities and concerns about the size of Upper Darby.

Roots said that he agreed a regional response was the most effective solution and that there had been preliminary gatherings to discuss that path. But he said it has been difficult to bring all parties together so far.

“Unfortunately it takes an emergency like this to really get us all to sit down at the table,” Roots said. He noted Chester and Upper Darby, as large municipalities, had the most at stake. Both have also faced major budget issues in recent years.

Leaders in Aston, Parkside, and Eddystone told The Inquirer they have been involved in conversations with other local leaders about the path forward for EMS services.

McGinn, the Aston Township supervisor, said he has met with local leaders about developing a municipal authority for paramedic services.

“These conversations are early, but interest is high in working together,” McGinn said in an email.

Shirley Purcival, the president of Parkside Borough Council, said Parkside officials have been meeting with officials in Aston, Upland, Brookhaven, and Nether Providence for weeks discussing purchasing an ambulance to serve the communities. Those conversations, she said, had not involved Upper Darby, which she said is a larger township with different needs.

It is unclear what the partnerships between municipalities would look like or how soon they could come together.

In the meantime, the loss of Crozer will add additional stress to remaining services until a solution is found, Swarthmore Mayor Marty Spiegel said.

“Every other community that does have emergency services is going to be called on to do a larger job,” he said.

Inquirer staff writer Harold Brubaker contributed to this article.

Editor’s note: This story has been updated to clarify details of Crozer’s closure process.