Crossville City Council Member James Mayberry said funding concerns were the reason he wanted to send the proposal for a city-based ambulance service to a referendum.
Mayberry said the council has been talking about an ambulance service for about a year now, but had underestimated what the actual cost would be to start an ambulance service. Mayberry said he believes the council should not make that decision for the city of Crossville.
“Well, it’s a pretty big project, and when you are looking at a potential of doubling or more than doubling the city property tax, I think that should be put up to the voters to decide if they think it’s worthwhile enough to spend that amount of money,” Mayberry said.
Mayberry said moving too fast is what has led the council to this point.
“There’s such a thing as wants and needs,” Mayberry said. “I mean, you can want everything in the world, but do you really need it, and I don’t think we need it. I think, as I said, I think our county does an excellent job with our ambulance service.”
The council has been presented with different options on how a city-based ambulance service could be started without taking on as much of the startup cost upfront. Some of those options include financing equipment and ambulances. Mayberry said, despite the different options, he is still against an ambulance service as he believes choosing a different option would delay the inevitable.
“These ambulances have to be housed,” Mayberry said. “They can’t be sitting outside all the time. Of course, we are in the process of building a new fire hall right now, which would house one of them. And then they wanted, like I said, the expansion at the number one fire hall to handle two more, and I don’t know where they were planning to put the fourth one. I asked that a while back, and they said, ‘Well, we will just keep it at the maintenance shop.’ Okay, there’s some more thought that needs to go into it.”
Mayberry also mentioned that part of the ambulance service is cross-training part-time firefighters and part-time ambulance drivers. Mayberry said that from the people he has talked to in that business, they have said cross-training and part-time positions are not desirable.
