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Council examining options |
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Wednesday, 16 December 2009 |
By MELANIE MOORE
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BLACKFOOT — The Blackfoot City Council may decide to provide ambulance service to the city while Bingham County provides a separate service after the county commissioners refused to pay their portion of overages for the ambulance service.
The Blackfoot Fire Department would still provide fire services to Blackfoot and the Fire District, which includes Blackfoot School District, Snake River School District and half of the Firth School District.
The ambulance contract provided emergency service to the country via the Blackfoot Fire Department.
Fire Chief Kevin Gray presented the council with four potential options for the city to continue having an ambulance service through the Fire Department.
The other options were shifting personnel from the ambulance budget to the fire budget and sharing costs with the fire district, moving 12 fire employees onto the county payroll or letting the county take over the ambulance service.
Council members found none of these options feasible.
They were willing to negotiate and investigate the possibility of having a city-only ambulance service while still providing fire services to the fire district.
However, the city fathers are not sure who owns the ambulances currently in use, and an agreement was never made between the city and county as to who truly owns the vehicles.
The Fire Department would need three ambulances to operate within the city. It would also need to maintain a staff of 18 firefighters and two staff members. Currently, the Fire Department has nine critical care paramedics.
The Blackfoot Fire Department is budgeted a total of $2.19 million, with $944,667 allocated to the ambulance service. The fire district pays half, and the rest is covered by medical billing. The shortfall, which was $164,000, happens when bills are not collected. Moore said the department collects on approximately 70 percent of bills.
While the council members are entertaining the idea of a city-only ambulance service, they recognized the need for several items to align for the city-only ambulance service to come to fruition.
First, they would need to get a portion of the county's ambulance levy, which is estimated at $200,000. City Attorney Dan Acevedo expressed concerns that option may not be possible because of state law or precedent.
In addition, administrators of the fire district would need to agree to pay half of the overages.
The city will also need to create an agreement with Bingham Memorial Hospital to help offset some of the costs, such as billing.
"There may be something that can be worked out there," Acevedo said.
The council members agreed there are many aspects and costs associated with operating an ambulance service, and are concerned the quality of service would be significantly lower if the county decides to go with a third-party provider.
"The trend is fire-based EMS," Moore said. "It just makes sense."
Mayor Mike Virtue said one of the problems facing ambulance services is trying to provide the best level of service at the most economical price.
The council members agreed that if the option for the city-only ambulance service doesn't work, service would need to be cut back and the quality of service would decrease.
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Last Updated ( Thursday, 17 December 2009 )
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