Since working in earnest to establish a municipal ambulance service for Auburn, city hall has time and time again insisted that the operation could be run in such a way as to have no impact on taxpayers.
Looking back on the first full year of running the service, a major flaw in the belief that user fees would cover the cost of the operation seems to be emerging, with collected revenue coming about $1 million short of covering expenses.
Though we were skeptical back when this service was first pitched as one that would be self-sustaining, it's not our intent now to say "we told you so" but rather encourage the city to put in the work to improve the situation.
On the plus side, the city plans to hire a collections agency to recoup some of its unpaid bills. We suspect mixed results, because in many cases, people who call for an ambulance are already struggling to pay for utilities and groceries, let alone hundreds of dollars in medical expenses. That being said, collections efforts are certainly worth a shot, because recapturing a percentage of lost revenue is better than collecting nothing at all.
People are also reading…
Additionally, every effort needs to be made to find ways to make the service more efficient from both the revenue collection side and the cost side.
As City Councilor Jimmy Giannettino noted recently, our representatives in Albany may be able to help Auburn and other municipal ambulance companies by pushing for faster turnaround on reimbursements from insurance companies and government programs, and that's important to work on to help with the revenue stream, in addition to the small dent a collection agency could make.
But the council also has to grapple with the service's costs and dig into any ways to reduce them without sacrificing service quality. The monthly budget report that was released at last week's city council meeting showed the ambulance service is running well over its budget. One graph included with that report shows expenses through January were at $2.13 million vs. a budgeted amount that was projected to be at $1.68 million through that point.
Giannettino has consistently supported a municipal ambulance as an important service on par with fire and police protection. We agree that public safety is about more than just dollars and cents, but government also has a responsibility to provide publicly funded services in the most cost-efficient ways possible. It's clear that Auburn's ambulance service has work to do to keep the promise that it not become a burden for taxpayers.
有料盒子 Editorial board includes聽president and director of local sales and marketing Michelle Bowers, executive editor Jeremy Boyer and managing editor Mike Dowd.
