A. No volunteer emergency medical services agency or volunteer firefighting organization shall be established in any locality on or after July 1, 1984, without the prior approval by ordinance or resolution of the governing body. Such ordinance or resolution shall specify the geographic boundaries of the agency’s primary service area within the locality.

Terms Used In Virginia Code 15.2-955

  • City: means an independent incorporated community which became a city as provided by law before noon on July 1, 1971, or which has within defined boundaries a population of 5,000 or more and which has become a city as provided by law. See Virginia Code 1-208
  • County: means any existing county or such unit hereafter created. See Virginia Code 15.2-102
  • Governing body: means the board of supervisors of a county, council of a city, or council of a town, as the context may require. See Virginia Code 15.2-102
  • Locality: means a county, city, or town as the context may require. See Virginia Code 1-221
  • Town: means any existing town or an incorporated community within one or more counties which became a town before noon, July one, nineteen hundred seventy-one, as provided by law or which has within defined boundaries a population of 1,000 or more and which has become a town as provided by law. See Virginia Code 15.2-102

B. Each locality shall seek to ensure that essential emergency medical services are maintained throughout the entire locality.

C. An emergency medical services agency that responds to medical emergencies for its primary service area as defined by the local emergency medical response plan shall be a designated emergency response agency and recognized as an integral and essential part of the official public safety program of the county, city, or town with responsibility for providing emergency medical response.

1984, c. 599, § 15.1-26.01; 1997, c. 587; 2005, c. 418; 2015, cc. 502, 503; 2023, cc. 458, 459.