By Charlene Sims, info@linncountyjournal.com
MOUND CITY – The Linn County Commissioners had an initial discussion with the American Medical Response (AMR) supervisors on Monday, March 3, about the county’s contract which is up for renewal at the end of 2025.
AMR Operations Manager Dawn Brooks told the commissioners that while they had not yet received the financial figures back yet for Linn County that Global Medical Response (GMR) Regional Director Jason Jenkins was there to speak with them. GMR is the parent company of AMR.
Jenkins who has been with AMR throughout its contracts in Linn County and lives at Linn Valley said that historically the ambulance contracts with Linn County had been for about five years at a time. He said that seems to have worked out well for AMR and Linn County.
Jenkins said that he was there to just get the renewal on the commissioners’ calendar and find out some opinions about any changes that the commissioners wanted. He said that other wise the date could just be changed on the new contract.
Commission Chair Jim Johnson asked if that meant the price would stay the same.
Jenkins said that he thought it really would. He said that AMR’s finance team was reviewing that but he didn’t really expect that there would be any changes.
Jenkins said that the only change he might recommend is annual increases or consumer price (CPI) language that would be written in the contract and that way the county would not be surprised by a midyear ask for an increase but instead the information would be available at the county’s budget time.
“If you are satisfied today with the number of ambulances that you have in the community and the supervisor in Centerville. “If that’s still working for you, we don’t have to make any changes,” said Jenkins. “And if you’re looking at doing something different, then we would want to know that we could get you the resources that you want.”
Commissioner Alison Hamilton asked if there were any changes that had been mentioned by over the years.
Johnson said that nobody had complained to him about how the system was set up.
Jenkins went back over the history of the county’s ambulance service. He explained that originally the ambulances were stationed at Mound City, La Cygne, and Pleasanton and some constituents on the westside of the county were upset about their service.
Jenkins said, “A lot of that has been historically the commission’s choice on kind of where they wanted ambulances and those sorts of things.”
Jenkins continued, “I think from a professional guidance standpoint, I think that you are sufficiently staffed and have the ambulances where you should. You don’t have too many and you don’t have too few. I think in your community it works well.”
Johnson stated that the times were a little longer in Commission District 3 for the transporting ambulance to arrive.
Jenkins said that due to their concerns, the station with a supervisor and supervisor’s vehicle was set up at Centerville. The supervisor can go out and treat the patient until the ambulance gets there. Patients can only be transported to the hospital by the ambulance, not the supervisor’s vehicle.
In January 2024, Centerville resident Brenda Conner expressed concerns to the commission about the the length of time it took for ambulances to arrive when dispatched to the west side of the county. She said she had a friend who lives six minutes from Centerville but when she fell it took an ambulance 30 to 45 minutes to get there.
“I know they have to come from this side of the county (east side), all we have on that side of the county is the EMT,” Conner said at that meeting. “Most of your population is on the east side but this side over here (west side) pays taxes too. They deserve to get help faster than 30 to 45 minutes.”
At Monday’s meeting, Jenkins told the commissioners that care starts the minute that someone dials 911. They are on the phone with the dispatch center getting instructions from a dispatcher if there’s a cardiac arrest exactly how to do CPR and those sorts of things.
He said that if it’s s significant illness or injury, the system is set up where a helicopter will launch at the exact same time and time critical diagnoses will end up in the city quickly. So the system works really, really well for not having a hospital in the community.
The February report showed that the average time for all three commission districts was 14 minutes 29 seconds. The response time for District 1 (La Cygne) was 12 minutes 8 seconds, for District 2 (Pleasanton) was 11 minutes 46 seconds and District 3 (Centerville, Blue Mound and Parker) 19 minutes 7 seconds.
According to former AMR operations manager Galen Anderson average time is figured for District 3, by averaging the time from when the supervisor arrives and when the transporting ambulance arrives. For example, the supervisor arrives in 10 minutes and the ambulance arrives in 20 minutes so the reported time is 15 minutes or the average of the two.
The average times for District 1 and District. 2 are actual arrival times of the ambulance, but not so in District 3. If the supervisor arrives in 10 minutes, an average time of 20 minutes could show that the actual arrival time of the ambulance is 30 minutes.
Commission Alison Hamilton told the AMR representatives, “I guess for me I don’t feel like we have really engaged the community about the need and so maybe during this time that’s kind of maybe our focus is to make sure services that we are providing are accurately serving the people so.”
Hamilton said she would also like to hear AMR staff input and asked Brooks if she could put together a questionnaire for the Linn County employees to see what they need.
AMR Centerville supervisor Louis Aloi told the commissioners that he had been here for eight years as a supervisor and before that he worked here as a medic for Pleasanton stations for about a year. He said it was a pretty good setup.
Aloi continued, “I’d always like to increase services. That’s my job is to protect Linn County when I’m here to make sure there is ambulance service provided.”
Johnson asked how the response times in Linn County compared to other counties in the area.
Aloi answered, We have three paramedics for 10,000 residents and that’s two trucks with an EMT. We have three stations serving a thousand calls a year. Because our hospitals are so far away, it takes our crews from tone time to return time sometimes up to 2.5 hours.
Alois said that AMR has three paramedics on staff. Bourbon County has 1.5 to 2 paramedics and they have more residents and they’re busier. We’re lucky we have it good here. The citizens get a really good service for the price.”
Brooks said that the supervisor response is the key that makes a huge difference. They can get care to people quickly and wait for the incoming ambulance.
AMR will meet with the commissioners on April 14 and learn the comments from each ambulance station.
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