Published: August 26, 2008 05:33 pm         

Committee OKs ambulance rate increase

The cost of a trip to the hospital in an ambulance will soon cost more.

Last week commissioners on the budget committee approved increasing the transport rates for the Cumberland County Ambulance Service based on a recommendation by EMS Director Victor Randolph.

Randolph was questioned by the committee previously about decreasing revenues for the ambulance service and increased overtime and expenses. Randolph was tasked by the committee to analyze the department and present the results to the budget committee with a recommendation. Randolph's research showed Cumberland County had the lowest rates compared to six surrounding counties.

"These revenue figures raise a red flag. We need to look at these every year at budget time. I make a motion that we look at these revenue figures each year as part of the budget process," said 5th District Commissioner Sharon York. Wendell Wilson, 6th District commissioner, supported the motion and it unanimously passed the committee.

Several commissioners who serve on the committee also requested Randolph to show them cost figures of operating two 12-hour shifts rather than the current 24-hour shifts in an effort to cut down on overtime costs.

"We would either have to hire more employees or cut out one of the sub-stations in order to go to 12-hour shifts," Randolph said.

Ninth District Commissioner Carmin Lynch pointed out to commissioners on the committee that in order to do it fairly, the county would have to tie a shift change to a pay scale change for employees.

Randolph explained EMS currently has 42 full-time employees and a 12-hour schedule would require and additional 14 employees to implement. This, Randolph said, this would cost a minimum of $500,000 to implement. This would not cover funding for employees' sick time or personal time or overtime.

"There would still be some overtime and that is not included," Randolph said.

Second District Commissioner Nancy Hyder asked, "Would you be able to find 14 to work for you full-time?"

"No. I might be able to find maybe five if I took all the applications that I have. It will cost a lot more and I can't even find that many to hire. The only other way is to cut substations out and you're looking at longer response times for calls and increased fuel costs," Randolph said.

Randolph recommended raising the base cost rate by $200 for an increase on basic life support (BLS non) non-emergency calls and basic life support (BLS emer) emergency calls. The rates will increase from $178.37 to $400 and $278.44 to $500, respectively.

Randolph recommended advanced life support calls and the remainder of call rates be increased as well by a minimum of $200.

After a line by line review with Randolph, the committee decided those rates will increase from $214, $338 and $478 to $550, $600 and $700 respectively.

Randolph also recommended mileage be increased from $9.17 per mile to a flat rate of $10 per mile.

Commissioners also agreed to increase the standby rate for ambulances from $40 per hour to $100. Standby is when an ambulance is at the race track, fair, or sporting events in case of an emergency.

"Even with these increases we will be among the middle ground by comparison to the counties around us," said 3rd District Commissioner Lynn Tollett.

A motion to make the increases was made by 2nd District Commissioner Nancy Hyder and supported by 8th District Commissioner Greg Maxwell.

It was passed unanimously by the full committee.

The increase must be approved by the full county commission before it can take effect. If passed by the full commission the increase will go into effect the following day.

"I think with this we will begin to see a turnaround in the revenues versus expenses in our ambulance service," Tollett said.

Later members of the committee decided to leave the ambulance service operating as it is on a 24-hour shift basis and keep the substations in operation.