The squabble on funding for rural Benton County ambulance service continues -- and will continue until all the cards are put into the game for open discussion. In so much of this discussion, the Justices of the Peace, the majority of which are from a city, talk around a long-term solution and no one wants to look at the history of Benton County tax distribution. You can argue my logic doesn't fit today's situation if you want, but that's like religion, it depends on whether you want to believe in a spiritual relationship with one God, based on Scripture, or if you are an agnostic. It is a matter of choice and I don't care one way or the other. The difference in this is a matter of finding a workable solution that we can all afford and live with.
If you break down the amount of taxes (real estate and personal property) collected for Benton County roads and look at the shift from the original distribution ( 50 percent to county, 50 percent to cities) to the current distribution, you will find the cities of Rogers, Bentonville and Siloam Springs get a larger percent of "their" road tax income (90 percent) than smaller (less politically connected) cities like Gravette, Pea Ridge (50 percent). Selective legislation provided for certain cities to increase their shares. A law restricting special legislation (written for certain municipalities) came after the Rogers, Bentonville and Siloam Springs distributions were changed from 50 percent to 90 percent. The idea originally was the city dwellers drove on county roads so they needed to help pay for the improvement and maintenance of those roads. Does the argument sound familiar? Isn't my sales tax on items purchased in the cities paying for city bonds and supporting city government in that city? Rural folks still use those county roads to get into the city to spend their money and pay those sales taxes. If the extra 40 percent collected by Rogers, Bentonville and Siloam Springs was credited to their ambulance account, and credit was given to the rural area from which it came, the cities might be indebted to the county for the service instead of asking for a subsidy.
The argument could go on forever because no one wants to pay extra taxes, or no more than they are required to pay. When the Quorum Court discusses this issue, they talk about a means of continuing to pay the cities -- not setting up a long-term solution that will allow the rural areas to provide their own service at some point in time.
This mess just gets worse and the editorials in the Morning News seem to forget we are all one county. We need transparency before anyone can resolve the issue between the cities and the county. Until a detailed study of where the out-of-city ambulance runs are made and the true facts are known by all, we are like a bunch of kids arguing about what type of music is best, or which artist is the better musician. No one seems to recognize that the Volunteer Ambulance Service of Northeast Benton County (VAS -- now part of NEBCO) was not an ALS (advanced life support) unit in the beginning. It received financial support from the residents it served because they wanted it to succeed and worked to guarantee its success. I was on VAS board of directors before I served on the Quorum Court, so I have some history on this example as a potential solution/model.
If rural Benton County doesn't want an ambulance service, is the Quorum Court going to shove it down their throats? If the rural patrons have the problem they should have the input into the solution, or even make their own arrangements for their EMS District as previously detailed in the original 911 research.
It seems redundant to say over and over, but the people most likely to need the ambulance, except automobile accidents involving out-of-area people, are the people who have the most trouble getting to Quorum Court meetings. They need Town Hall meetings, where interested parties can attend locally even if it is inconvenient for the Quorum Court members. They did get elected to serve, didn't they?
Somewhere in this seemingly endless debate, we need to find a permanent solution that is long-term, financially feasible and practical. Is that asking too much?
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Editor's note: Leo Lynch is an award-winning columnist. He is a native of Benton County has deep roots in northwest Arkansas. He is a retired industrial engineer and former Justice of the Peace. He can be contacted at [email protected].
Editorial on 06/04/2014