BROOKFIELD — Citing a “severe” cut in funding from the state, increasing health care costs and rising gasoline prices, Brookfield trustees voted 2 to 1 Saturday morning to place a 1-mill safety services tax levy on the November ballot, hoping residents value emergency services enough to pay more for them.

Trustee Gary Haun said he wanted to be very clear about what the money – roughly an additional $125,000 – would be used for and specifically said it would not be used for wages. He said the money, to be split between the police and fire departments at the trustees discretion, would be used to offset maintenance costs and for continued provision of ambulance and police services.

Fire Chief Keith Barrett, who wasn’t at the meeting, said last week the ambulances the department uses are sorely in need of maintenance and added that billing structures were likely to be changed just to keep the EMS on the road.

Haun said the township paid nearly $4,000 in repair bills for vehicles from the fire department in the last week. Barrett, who oversees the township’s health care insurance, said last month it was facing a 28-percent hike in premiums.

A handful of residents, most of whom regularly attend trustee’s meetings, said they were pleased with the service the paramedics provide, but questioned whether the township should consider doing away with the ambulance and hire an outside provider.

Haun and Trustee Phil Schmidt said response time is always an issue. Schmidt recalled a time when he called for an ambulance for his father and waited, he said, for “an ambulance to come from Sandy Lake,” in Mercer County, about 40 miles away.

Brookfield’s ambulance responds in about four minutes. “I’m proud of that,” said Schmidt, who was instrumental in developing the EMS program years ago.

Schmidt voted against the levy, however, because it wouldn’t include any money for the road department. He has said numerous times that trustees are mandated to provide for roads and he will not support a levy that doesn’t include that.

Schmidt said he understands the levy would be tough on residents.

“We’re all facing the same thing. Increased health care costs, the price of gas, a down economy. It isn’t just us. It’s every township in Ohio.”

He said if the levy doesn’t pass, “We’re up against it. We’re down to bare bones. If we don’t get it, it’s not going to get any better.”

Trustee Chairman Gary Lees said he is concerned about the amount of money the ambulance service appears to be losing. “Last year at this time we had $72,000. This year we are at $26,000. What are we doing wrong?”

He also acknowledges that many times the ambulance is called out and receives nothing for its services. As an example, he cited patients who are diabetic and call an ambulance when they feel their blood sugar is low. After the medics respond and treat them with medication, they feel better and don’t want to go to the hospital.

“So that’s manpower and equipment we’ve paid for and used and we get nothing back,” Lees said.

Trustees recently met with the woman who handles the billing for the ambulance services and are taking measures to make sure patients are billed for all the township can collect, including doing away with a provision that allowed Brookfield residents to not pay any additional money on top of what insurance paid.

Dan Suttles, a Brookfield resident and Warren, Ohio, firefighter, said trustees should let the people dictate what services they want to pay for and urged a levy for only the fire department. Suttles argued that the general “safety services” levy would pass on the reputation of the fire department, but trustees would still have the option of doing what they want with the money.

Suttles and another resident, Jeffrey Youngkins, also a firefighter, have often complained that the Masury substation of the fire department is closed from 7 p.m. to 7 a.m. and the community, they maintain, is at risk. Chief Barrett has said in the past he doesn’t have manpower to open that fire station 24 hours a day.

Haun said if a levy passes, that money could be used for maintenance, freeing up other money for staffing.

Suttles also complained about the service that Hartford receives from Brookfield firefighters and said that community should be asked to pay more. Hartford pays Brookfield $25,000 a year for assistance to their volunteer department.

Police Chief Dan Faustino said Saturday his department has cut back “everywhere we can” and doesn’t see a way to reduce operating costs any further.

He said he strives to keep two patrolmen on duty around the clock and many days he is on patrol. “My guys have worked to keep health insurance costs down, we save fuel where we can by using V-6 engines, we cut back the part-time force and eliminated a full-time position in 2010.”

The deadline to get the levy on the November ballot is Aug. 8, Haun said. Trustees will hold another meeting on the subject at 6 p.m. Monday.