[Goldwingnut]

Originally Posted by Stu from NYC

Hopefully Don Wiley will weigh in on this.

Busy this morning but this afternoon I will spend and hour to type up all the details and post them here. Bottom line the primary cause of the increase is the incorporation of the ambulance service. Previously it was a private service that cost the county/VPSD nothing, the problem was there were only 6 or 7 available in the entire county and once they rolled there were no longer available this led to very long wait times for transport. 45-60 min or more for an ambulance was unacceptable to the residents and they voiced their concerns to the BOCC. BOCC listened, VPSD listened. There are now about 16 ambulances staffed and on call 24/7 and staffed by firefighter-paramedics in the county. The cost increase you are seeing is to cover this additional availability for what is not covered by insurance for the actual transport service. This is what the county residents wanted and BOCC/VPSD is delivering. This cost increase was coming no matter which way the IFD vote went, the IFD vote did however impact how the costs are distributed, I'll touch on that in detail later today when I have more time.