West Shore Community College brings paramedic training to Traverse City
Traverse City will gain a 12-seat paramedic pipeline as local agencies try to cut ambulance gaps, burnout and response delays across Grand Traverse County.
Grand Traverse County’s emergency system already runs through a single countywide dispatch center, so every paramedic vacancy can ripple from Traverse City to the townships beyond it. Now West Shore Community College is bringing a new paramedic training program into Traverse City, a small local pipeline that leaders hope will help steady ambulance coverage and reduce pressure on overworked crews.
Munson Healthcare says classes will begin Aug. 28, with blended online instruction and one in-person day each week at Traverse City Fire Department Station 1, which has been approved as an alternate site for the college’s paramedic program. The program will be capped at 12 students, run through July 2027, and bring in new cohorts every fall semester. All classes will meet in the EMS education classroom at the Foster Family Community Healthcare Center, 550 Munson Ave. in Traverse City, while clinical training will take place at Munson Healthcare hospitals, area EMS agencies and other sites across Michigan.
The timing matters because Traverse City is in the middle of expanding its own ambulance transport capability. City voters approved restoring up to 1 mill for fire department emergency transportation services in November 2023 by a 2-to-1 margin, funding nine additional personnel, one captain, new equipment and two ambulances. The city has said its full transition to ambulance transport was targeted for July 2026. The first ALS transport ambulance was delivered in January 2025 and entered service in spring 2025, with a second expected in fall 2025.
That expansion has run into the same staffing crunch the training program is meant to address. One report said Traverse City Fire Department still needed to fill eight paramedic positions before a planned July 2026 ambulance launch. Even after hiring, new paramedics may need 90 days or longer to complete additional certification within the city’s medical control authority, delaying how quickly they can be put into service.
The shortage is not just local. Michigan Health Council says the number of EMS education programs in the state fell from 20 in 2014 to 17 in 2024, with most concentrated in southeast and western Michigan. A 2024 Michigan Healthcare Workforce Index projected 840 paramedic graduates for 2,000 job openings from 2023 to 2033, and a statewide shortage of 1,781 EMS professionals by 2033.
For Grand Traverse County, the value of the West Shore program will be measured in practical terms: how many vacancies it can help fill, how fast those trainees can move into local ambulances, and whether the county’s 911 system sees fewer coverage gaps as a result.
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