Westfield to impose fines for non-emergency 911 calls at assisted living homes

WESTFIELD, Ind. (WISH) — The Westfield Fire Department will start charging assisted living facilities for non-emergency 911 calls.

Fire Chief Rob Gaylor said Tuesday that it’s due to an increase of misuse of emergency services. He said 25% of all 911 emergency calls come from assisted care facilities and, of those calls, a third are non-emergencies. That’s tying up first responders from dealing with actual emergencies.

Some of the non-emergency to the Westfield emergency medical services deal with include lifting a patient or transporting patients to scheduled doctor’s appointments for conditions that are not life-threatening.

Gaylor said, “Those aren’t really life emergencies, and they’re better methods of getting someone transferred to those doctor’s appointments than calling 911.”

He pointed to private ambulances and other services that specializes in non-emergencies.

The Westfield City Council on Monday night approved a new ordinance that would charge assisted living facilities $500 for a first offense, another $500 for a second offense, and $1,000 for a third offense. The fines will be directed to the living facilities themselves and not the patient.

The fire chief said, “We’re not making money off of this. That’s not what it is intended to do. It’s intended to put facility on notice that ‘Hey, you’re not using 911 services the way they’re meant. You need to change the way you’re doing business.’”

In 2024, during peak times, the fire department saw 1,700 overlapping calls and they’re seeing an increase of non-emergency calls in 2025.

The Westfield government has three transporting medic units, and non-emergency calls can lead to longer response times for people who are truly in emergency situations. “We can’t turn the phone down so we don’t get to pick and choose and prioritize this run over that run, and so it’s tying up a lot of our resources.”

The new ordinance begins in October. For now, over the next few weeks, the fire department will work with residential care facilities to educate them proper emergency protocols.

News 8 reached out to various assisted facilities in the Westfield area. None responded.

The fire chief wants to make one one thing clear: Each call is still very important. They just want to prevent unnecessary non-emergency ones. Speaking from a fire station, he said, “At the end of the day, when the bells go off like you’ve heard, the men and women in this organization are going to hop on these trucks and provide service regardless of where it’s at or who it’s for.”

WISHTV.com first reported on the new law earlier Tuesday.

About The Author

See author's posts