BENTONVILLE -- Benton County's justices of the peace agreed Thursday to hold a special Quorum Court meeting next week to re-examine how to pay for rural ambulance service.
That decision came during a Finance Committee meeting attended by 12 of the 15 justices. All justices of the peace present agreed a special meeting was necessary. They decided to hold it after Tuesday's Committee of the Whole meeting, which starts at 6 p.m. at the County Administration Building.
Correction
A previous version of this story had incorrect vote totals. The error has been corrected.
At A Glance
Ambulance Costs
Benton County will pay the cities $942,000 this year for rural ambulance service. The cost of the service is expected to increase to $1.1 million next year and $1.2 million in 2016.
Source: Staff Report
Justices tried to devise a funding mechanism for rural ambulance last month. They approved ordinances that would levy a 0.2-mill countywide property tax and a $40-per-household fee on rural residents outside the Northeast Benton County Fire Department service area.
Neither plan advanced, however, because not enough justices of the peace approved the resolutions needed to place them on the Nov. 4 ballot. The deadline to pass any such resolutions is Aug. 26.
Mike McKenzie, District 1 justice of the peace, said he believed a special meeting was in order, adding he thought most justices were surprised by how the votes turned out last month.
"I would think we owe it to everybody out there who's going to pay one way or another to come to some kind of resolution and invest the time to do it one more time," McKenzie said.
Barry Moehring, District 15 justice of the peace, agreed.
"It just felt like the way those votes went that night, it seems like we should have one more crack at it, on behalf of the voters," Moehring said.
Tom Allen, District 4 justice of the peace and Finance Committee chairman, said the county will have to make some serious budget cuts if it can't raise additional revenue to pay for ambulance service. That would be the case if justices decide not to put a funding mechanism on the ballot or if voters reject any additional tax.
Service to the county's unincorporated areas is provided by seven municipal fire departments and the Northeast Benton County Fire Department. State law requires a "mutually acceptable" agreement between the cities and the county if municipal ambulance service is to be used outside the cities. Talks about the cost of ambulance service have been going on since 2009.
Allen suggested cuts the county could make. The county could cut the number of new fire trucks it buys each year, he said. He also mentioned possible cuts to personnel, including an environmental police officer, a deputy prosecutor and a deputy public defender.
"I don't (say) these to endorse these, I do it to get it out," Allen said. "I want the people in the county to read about what kind of cuts we're going to be faced with."
Allen also suggested imposing a 2 percent budget cut on all county departments to provide the ambulance money.
Leaders of the three departments Allen mentioned addressed the justices of the peace about the repercussions of losing personnel. All three said they already face challenges keeping up with their work loads.
Nathan Smith, deputy prosecutor, said losing a deputy prosecutor would increase the length of time needed to prosecute cases. That would mean the county would spend more money housing defendants in the jail, he said.
He also said his office has one prosecutor dedicated full-time to covering sex crimes. That person would have to be pulled out of that role, Smith said.
"Any time you do something new, there are unintended consequences," he said.
John Sudduth, county administrator of general services, oversees the county's two environmental officers. He said they have more than 200 environmental cases open. He pleaded with the justices of the peace not to cut one of his positions and to let him decide where to find cuts in his department.
"I'm fully prepared to justify my staff and what we do," Sudduth said. "We have fine-tuned this system. So give us the opportunity to still exist."
Kurt Moore, District 13 justice of the peace, said no matter what the Quorum Court decides in terms of a funding mechanism, "We need to plan and do the (2015) budget as if we're not getting any new money. It's a lot easier to put money back in than at the last minute take it out."
NW News on 08/08/2014