VALLEY COUNTY, Idaho — Valley County voters are in control of the Emergency Medical Services (EMS) across the county by way of two separate votes on the Nov. 7 ballot to restructure and fund a new ambulance district.
EMS services are not considered 'essential' by the state government like Police and Fire; local governments and counties are in charge of ensuring a trained EMT can arrive at an emergency. This creates problems in rural parts of the state that often rely on volunteers to cover the necessary ground.
"We've outgrown that model. We need 24/7 coverage on the ambulances," McCall Fire Chief Garrett De Jong said. "And we're just trying to come up with realistic solutions to address this problem."
The solution, in part, is the proposed creation of a new ambulance district. The first ballot question, requiring a simple majority to pass, seeks to empower the Valley County Commissioners to create a three-man EMS Commission tasked with EMS specific duties.
"If the new EMS district passes, there'll be three EMS commissioners similar to a fire district that meet once a month. They're really a volunteer position, they get paid a stipend per meeting that can't exceed $100," De Jong said. "Just because of all the growth and the different demands on their time, EMS has taken a backseat in the county for 15 years... We typically get about a 15-minute meeting annually to discuss the state of EMS and come up with solutions which just isn't enough time."
The second ballot question is the funding arm. Current Valley County property owners are paying $12 per $100,000 in assessed property value for the current EMS budget; the proposed new levy rate will increase that annual tax payment to $40 per $100,000 in assessed value, according to EMS district spokesperson McKenzie Kraemer.
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