Nice video and even a nicer rig!
About EMS being separate from LE. Well, in its purest concept: yes that's the idea.
Each emergency service provider should be a specialized agency. However, in the real world there are many situations where "specialties" are mixed and a single agency has to deal with multiple type incidents. This is more common in two opposite scenarios: large urban areas and remote locations.
More specifically about EMS and Law Enforcement, nowadays it's common for a Police, Sheriff or Highway Patrol dept. to have "EMT-Ts" / Tactical Paramedics only among their SWAT, ESU, SER teams. However in the early 1900s some LE agencies in the US and other countries had regular ambulance services.
In Los Angeles City, for example, the ambulance service used to be part of the Police Dept. (LAPD) until it was transfered to LAFD. Even some of the early city lifeguards were part of LAPD. -(Later some were transfered to the City R&P Dept. and others were merged with the County LG Service).
County wide, the main EMS is part of the LACoFD however the LACo Sheriff's Dept. has ambulances of its own which are part of the Emergency Service Detail. (They are the main responder agency for flood rescues, air ops, tech rescues, etc. in NW LACo).
In NYC, NYPD Aviation division have helicopters staffed with paramedics and flights nurses that I think are not tactical since they calls have an advanced EMS nature not a tactical one -unlike NYPD ESU medics / EMT-Ts. PAPD (the NY/NJ Port Authority Police Dept.) provides fire service in JFK Airport (police-firefighters).
Same goes for Maryland State Police famous helicopters that are black with the state flag colors on it. As far as I know they respond to advanced medical emergencies. -I doubt they have to be trained in tactical EMS.
Also, many USAR teams have staff trained in multiple fields.
This is a common practice of large public safety agencies. I don't believe it means that in the future EMS will become a division of Law Enforcement agencies. Actually, in my field (aquatic safety) more divisions are being transfered from LE agencies to FDs than in the opposite way.
A couple of examples are the City of Miami Beach Beach-Patrol and the Miami Dade County Ocean Rescue which used to belong to the respective PDs and now they are part of the respective Fire-Rescue Depts. Same happenned in Galveston, TX: the BP used to be part of the Sheriff's Dept. and now it belongs to the FD.
On the other hand, in some areas where there is still a need for it, there are armed lifeguards (CA State Parks, Volusia County - FLA, etc.). Again, this doesn't mean that one day there'll be armed lifeguards at your local YMCA pool.
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About the emergency lights color issue, some agencies that haven't been able to be exempt from following a certain state regulation have to use different light colors for the different vehicles -even within the same division.
Again, another example in my filed: most public lifeguard services in Southern California use red lights for their trucks and SUVs, however due to a state regulation, all boats belonging to an agency with Law Enforcement authority (Police, Sheriff, USCG, Harbor Patrols, lifeguards, park rangers, etc.) have to have blue lights. Besides the estetic issue, it would be less confusing for the general public if all land and water vehicles had same color lights.
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I personally believe that it is an advantage to have some public safety agencies which among their divisions have personnel trained in multiple fields (LE, EMS, rescue, fire fighting, SCUBA, air ops., etc.). -Not for routine incident response but for those situations that requires an emergency responder with more than one perspective.
Back to the main issue, there were, are and will be situations* where a person trained in both Law Enforcement and Pre-hospital Medical Emergency Care would be more useful than having separate LE and EMS personnel arguing about each agency's priorities. *(Besides those Speacial Weapons And Tactical -related ones).
<<JUST MY OPINION>>
Guri
