At the latest Emergency Medical Services Interim Committee meeting, federal dollars set aside in a Rural Health Transformation Fund were discussed to help gaps in EMS funding.
The one-time funds were made possible through the One Big Beautiful Bill Act passed by Congress.
Laura Ringling is the Senior Policy Advisor for the Governor’s Office. She said while nothing’s finalized yet, there are plans for the state’s Emergency Medical Services to get a boost from the funds.
“In the EMS space we would be looking at technology support. We know we’re doing some technology grants and things like that, and so I think there’s room in that space. And as well as incentivizing coordination of services, potentially regional hubs, allowing shared services so that we can lower overhead costs for folks and providing services,” Ringling said. “[We’re also] looking at anything we can do to improve patient outcomes and response time. There’ll be workforce support, not only through kind of recruitment and retention initiatives, but also through training. But again, where we have to draw the line is it’s not a sustainable funding source.”
Ringling said that means one-time opportunities to provide support that can last beyond when the funds are available.
She explained in further detail potential plans for workforce development of EMS personnel.
“I think the intent is to be able to stand up, use this one-time money to stand up, certain training programs, maybe create a hub of resources for folks and then that would be self-sustaining, ongoing,” Ringling said. “There’d still be a cost for folks to participate in that training, but the one-time startup costs could really be used to establish and solidify and make that training broadly available.”
She said the next steps are finalizing stakeholder engagements and prepare South Dakota’s application ahead of the Nov. 5 deadline.
