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Somebody_Call_an_Ambulance

Feature Article March 27

Feature Article March 27, 2003

LAND O' LAKES NewsWeb Home

Somebody call an ambulance

The state of relations between the city of Kingston and the Frontenac Management Board (FMB) has deteriorated to the level of name calling. Many out here in the wilderness wonder why we should care, except to delight in politicians calling each other names.

However, it turns out that the City of Kingston controls the bulk of social services that are delivered in our region, even if we never vote in their elections. Ontario Works, Childrens Services, Daycare subsidy, Seniors Services, Social Housing, and other services that are sometimes required by rural people are designed and administered in offices deep in the heart of urban Kingston, where the rural reality is often ignored.

When services were downloaded by the province, the main exception to things being administered for Frontenac County by the City of Kingston was in the area of Land Ambulance.

For the FMB, which is presided over by the Frontenac and Wolfe Island Mayors, land ambulance has had great importance as the one universal service they manage for themselves and the city.

The FMB points to improvements in the service since downloading as a matter of pride. They feel they have been able to make it a better rural service without neglecting the people of Kingston. The FMB partnered with other rural governments to form a multi-county management structure, and now that that has ended, they think they are ready to take the service on in its entirety.

Even for the informed, it is not an easy thing to determine whether the proposal to set up an FMB ambulance service in place of the existing contracts is a good idea. From the outside looking in, it is impossible to say.

City staff says more money will be required for administration, while the FMB staff argue the savings will outweigh the costs over time, and the service will improve.

Whether the service contracts are extended or the FMB takes over will not bring any obvious or immediate changes in the actual service people see. This fight will not lead to ambulances coming off the road.

The City thinks of themselves, in Kingston Mayor Isabel Turners words: as the best customer for the service, since we pay 86% of the costs. City of Kingston politicians dont want to be handed a decision by the FMB. They probably also dont want to see an FMB logo on the ambulances racing across Kingston.

When the two sides meet next week, neither will be in a mood for compromise. In fact a rumble is more likely. Maybe there should be an ambulance available, just in case things get out of hand. Jeff Green

With the participation of the Government of Canada