Authorization to Release Section 37 funds to fund the Production and Installation of a Heritage Plaque to Commemorate the History of Toronto’s First Organized Ambulance Service - by Councillor Kristyn Wong-Tam, seconded by Councillor Shelley Carroll

Toronto's first Mayor and leader of the 1837 Upper Canada Rebellion, William Lyon Mackenzie, may have worked as a carter during this time. Over the next decades, the task of moving the seriously ill or injured to hospitals was carried out by a mix of private and public services. Starting in 1888, the new Toronto Police Ambulance Service, based at Police Headquarters at 10 Court Street, began to handle emergency medical runs. The police division operated four horse-drawn ambulances and the officers received basic medical training from St. John Ambulance. In the 1930s, the ambulance services became the responsibility of the Department of Public Health, and the Police no longer provided ambulance services. Despite improvements, the City's emergency medical system was divided into small jurisdictions and lacked a central dispatch centre, resulting in delays responding to calls. From the 1950s to the 1970s, Toronto's ambulance services were improved, reorganized, and amalgamated. In February 1975, Toronto's last remaining private ambulance services were merged with public services to create the modern Toronto EMS. With the opening of the Toronto Ambulance Headquarters, located at 4330 Dufferin Street, in 1981, and the introduction of 911 service to Toronto in 1982, the City's emergency medical services became recognizable as the modern system in place today. Since then, the introduction of portable defibrillators and improvements to emergency medical care have drastically improved outcomes for people who need urgent transportation to hospital. As Heritage Toronto is a directly funded City agency and not an "outside party", no undertaking is required to be signed by Heritage Toronto to govern the use of the funds and financial reporting.