Calls for fire/EMS service in Leland Township appeared to plateau last year — however, calls have more than doubled from a decade ago.
Fire Chief Dan Besson presented the 2023 annual report at Saturday’s annual meeting at the Munnecke Room in Leland.
Four-hundred , sixty-three calls were recorded last year, down from 509 the previous year and 58 short of the record high of 521, recorded in 2021.
Rescues and EMS calls topped out at 254 last year, two short of the previous year, representing 54.9% of total responses.
“In comparison to 2022 the number of responses to fires decreased from 23 to 19 and EMS decreased … We also saw an uptick in ‘good intent’ type calls,” Besson said.
The township is served from two locations with stations in Leland and Lake Leelanau. The unincorporated village of Leland was the busiest for the department with 151 calls in 2023, up 37 from 2022. The unincorporated village of Lake Leelanau had 121 calls, down 35 from 2022.
Besson explained that when a person calls 9-1-1 in Leelanau County for medical assistance, the dispatcher, sitting at the Sheriff’s office, processes the information the caller gives and assigns the patient a priority.
Some “key words” that a caller may say, such as “chest pain” has the dispatcher assign them “priority one” but after an assessment on scene that patient may be updated or downgraded in priority.
July was the busiest for EMS calls at 75, up 14 from the previous year. September had the second-highest total of dispatches at 52, up 13 from the previous year.
The busiest day of the week was Friday at 78 incidents. The lowest was Tuesday, with 57 incidents, according to the report.
Between the hours of noon and 6 p.m. provided to be the busiest for Leland Township’s fire/EMS crews at 154. Not far behind was the period of 6 p.m. to midnight at 131. And 122 incidents were reported from 6 a.m. to noon.
