Benton County Officials Eye Social Media Outlets

BENTONVILLE -- Benton County officials will use social media as part of their voter education effort before the Nov. 4 election to decide on how to pay for rural ambulance service.

Joel Jones, justice of the peace for District 7, created a Facebook page -- Benton County Ambulance Service Ballot Measures -- as a clearinghouse for the schedule of town hall meetings on the proposed plans, a platform for a PowerPoint presentation he has prepared on the issue and other information. Jones also linked to a blog post by Barry Moehring of District 15 on the ambulance issue.

"I hope to have links for sample ballots and the presentation I'm going to provide to the other JPs if they want to use it," Jones said. "I also want to have a link to the EMS study the county did so people on Facebook can have access to that information."

The county will ask voters to consider two plans to pay part of the cost of ambulance service in unincorporated areas. The county will pay about $942,000 this year to the seven cities providing ambulance service. The cost is expected to increase to about $1.1 million in 2015.

One proposal would levy 0.2 mills to raise an estimated $833,000 annually. The tax would apply to all residents.

The second proposal, to form an emergency medical services district with a $40 fee, would raise about $527,000 a year. The district would include the unincorporated areas except the area served by the Northeast Benton County Fire Department.

The county's websites also will be part of the social media campaign. County Judge Bob Clinard instructed Marshal Watson, public safety administrator, to use the Facebook page and Twitter account of the Department of Emergency Management to provide links to information on the county website. The BC Alert system also will be used to link people to the town hall schedule and other information, Clinard said. There are 11,861 subscribers to BC Alert, Watson said.

Clinard said he isn't an active user of social media, but if the county can use it to get information to voters he's supportive of doing so.

"I'm not a Facebook or Twitter guy," Clinard said. "But if we can put something on there that says 'Please go to the Benton County website to check out plans for EMS,' we can do that."

Kurt Moore of District 13 said he's familiar with social media, although he's not a regular user.

"I'm not on Facebook, my wife is," Moore said. "I think word can get around pretty well, especially on Facebook if your friends like it and get their friends to like it. A juicy piece of gossip tends to fly out there. I wouldn't say it's ineffective. I tried it myself for a little while and found it more of an annoyance."

Patrick Carr of District 12 said he sees a use for social media, but doesn't expect it to have a great impact on the election.

"I'm probably one of the most tech-savvy people on the Quorum Court and I'm not doing anything right now," Carr said. "I just don't see a need for it right now. I'll put something on my personal Facebook page a week before our event here in Siloam Springs and probably again a week before the election. I am planning on putting information out where it's closer to my event. There's an inordinate amount of information out there right now. We need to keep people in the loop about what we're doing."

Moehring plans to continue to blog about the election as the justices of the peace work their way through the town hall meetings and up to the Nov. 4 election.

"I do plan on continuing to be active, making sure people know when and where the meetings are and sharing information," he said.

Moehring said he may use social media as a vehicle to provide more detailed answers to questions raised at the town hall meetings.

"Those tools are great for getting information out to people," he said. "We want to get the word out and make sure people know what they're voting on."