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Show ' Stste i Ambulance service: Do we or don't we? rress Ambulance service continues to bo an unanswered, often up in the-air question in Iron County. As of August 10, all "loan" money, which was actually in the form of a grant or subsidy, to Don Barnes and his Southern Cross Ambulanc e Service will cease. The Iron County Commission had granted $2,000 to Barnes to pay any accounts payable in order to stay in business. Temporarily, at least. In the meantime, different options are being weighted by the parties involved. in-volved. And even former local ambulance am-bulance interests are making bids for involvement. "By gosh, we are going to have to do something," Commission Chariman 11. Grant Seaman said. "This has been a tough one and I still don't know how we are going to work it out." Although the problem is not on the verge of being resolved. Seaman said the "best bet" for a solution is to have Cedar City or Valley View Medical Center run the county ow ned ambulance am-bulance with a back-up unit, to be purchased from Barnes, established at Parowan. Seaman said Delbert Sperry, state emergency operations official, has offered the county "a good deal" for a new ambulance, which would be the major operating vehicle within the county, if the county commissioners decided to go that route. He also said a meeting of all interested in-terested parties-mayors of Parowan and Cedar City, hospital . administrators, ad-ministrators, county commissioners-was commissioners-was pending toget input from all directions. Commissioner Jim Clark said he feels the county can't continue to support Barnes and further predicted the county will have to go into the ambulance business sooner or later. He said if a second ambulance i purchased, pur-chased, a major point of Barnes' arguments, it should be owned by the county, not someone else. Barnes said he has used the entire $2000 allotted to him on one bill "burned up an engine"-and expects to be behind on payments again next month. He said he "hates to see the county take over" ambulance service entirely. He said there is not enough personnel trained locally to take the responsibility. respon-sibility. A volunteer based ambulance service is not a good idea for this area, he said, due to the scattered population. Barnes also maintains he could "probably" pay for a second unit, if it were purchased for him, by the added number of transfer runs to Salt Lake City that would then be possible. He said in recent weeks he has been unable to make long runs or long distance transfers due to having no second stand-by vehicle. But Barnes also said there is not enough calls in Iron County for more than one ambulance service. He said if he was really "in it for the money" he would make only long transfer calls and not "cover the town." In a letter to the County Commission, Reed Embley, Utah Manager of Deseret Ambulance service and presently operator of North Davis Ambulance Service, offered an ambulance am-bulance service to Iron County for long distance transfers. He said he would enter into an agreement with the county to provide long distance runs, but would not be obligated to stay in the county for "emergency trama runs." However, Embley said, "when the ambulance is in Iron County and when there is a crew available, we will be very happy to respond to any medical emergency." Barnes said he feels the state would not allow such a long -distance-only agreement. He said he, too, would like to take only long transfers because of the money involved. Barnes also responded to recent criticism on local radio spots as to why he doesn't have a new ambulance by saying, "it is the men in the ambulance, am-bulance, not the ambulance, that saves lives." He said what is really needed is a subsidy for a second unit, "because that is the whole point: the money is being lost by not being able to make the long transfers." |