Ronan pays dispatch fees, but questions billing ambulance service
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RONAN – Ronan City Council voted pay the last installment of the 2014-2015 fiscal year’s billing for emergency dispatch services, but mulled whether or not some of the billing should be transferred to the business owner who runs the local ambulance service.
The $30,000 bill used to be split equally between the Ronan Fire Department, the then city-owned ambulance service, and police department, according to Mayor Kim Aipperspach. It pays for emergency service dispatch in non-emergencies. A few years ago the town voted to contract its ambulance services out to a private operator. At first the ambulance operator paid a third of the bill, but somehow the full cost has been levied to the police department in recent years.
Aipperspach said he believes some of the cost should be born by the ambulance operator and that funds are tight in the city’s budget.
“The money tree we planted out back did not get enough water this year,” Aipperspach said. “It’s not been doing well.”
Aipperspach said he has not been able to find where any other communities pay as much as Ronan for the services, if anything at all.
“That doesn’t seem right,” Councilmember Robert McCrea said.
Taxes levied from members of the ambulance district also do not flow through the city anymore, Aipperspach claimed.
City Attorney Kathleen O’Rourke Mullins said she would look into where the funds go and where they should go.
Despite their questions, the council approved paying last year’s final installment.
“We want to put a good foot forward,” Councilmember Cal Hardy said.
