Future of Denbigh ambulance base remains in doubt

L&A County refuses to affirm support for northern service

Addington Highlands Reeve Henry Hogg tried to force Lennox and Addington County's hand last week, but in the end he did not have the votes to do so.

Hogg submitted the following notice of motion to be voted on at the January 25 L&A Council meeting:

“Whereas the location of the Northbrook Ambulance base is about to be determined and its optimum location depends on whether the Denbigh Ambulance base is in service; Therefore be it resolved that the Council of the County of Lennox and Addington will maintain the Denbigh Ambulance Base as a 24 hour, 7 day a week service; and further, that future negotiations with neighbouring municipalities will aim to recover full cost for cross-border calls from this base.”

The motion was supported by Hogg himself as well as Addington Highlands Deputy Reeve Bill Cox and Stone Mills Township Reeve Doug Bearance, but three other members of Council voted against it and L&A Warden Bill Lowry declared the motion defeated.

The vote does not commit the council to closing the 24-hour base. However, last fall a consultant’s report recommended that the Denbigh base close and its annual operations budget be transferred to a new base to built in the vicinity of Odessa in Loyalist Township. Council has yet to decide whether to accept that recommendation or not.

Last week’s vote on the Denbigh base could be an indication of the potential result of that upcoming decision.

Currently, Frontenac County ambulances dispatched from Kingston answer about 1,000 calls per year in Loyalist Township, and L&A is billed for those calls under a cross-border service agreement that is set to expire in 2015. Paramedics stationed in Denbigh respond to a limited number of calls each year, and a high percentage of those calls come from Frontenac County.

Although Frontenac County pays L&A twice as much per call for Denbigh-based calls as L&A pays for Kingston-based calls into Loyalist Township, the net result of the cross border agreement is still a payment of about $120,000 each year from L&A to Frontenac.

In the fall, while he was still the L&A County Warden, Henry Hogg wrote to the councils of Frontenac, Renfrew, and Hastings Counties asking for financial support to keep the Denbigh base open.

While L&A ratepayers shoulder most of the $500,000 annual municipal cost of keeping the base open, the base serves remote residents in the other three counties as well.

A meeting between the wardens and CAOs from the four counties took place in mid-January. L&A County Chief Administrator Larry Keech summed up the results of that meeting.

“It does not appear that any assistance is forthcoming from any of our neighbours,” he said.