The DeWitt County Board held a special work session Thursday evening to focus on the future of the county's ambulance services.

The focus of Thursday's discussion was on assembling a board versus a committee, who should be on said committee or board, and what their responsibilities will be. County Board member Ed Young felt for many reasons a board separate from the County Board should be assembled.
He notes once that board has been assembled, it will be their responsibility to form the ambulance service.

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Ed Young says, should a board be assembled, the County Board will have no involvement with the service other than handing them the money from the levy. He believes the County Board shouldn't have involvement with that board either. The ambulance service then falls solely on them. Young compares what the ambulance board would be to the Human Resource Center's 708 Board.

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DeWitt County State's Attorney Dick Koritz stresses the decision lies with the 12 members of the County Board. He says they can take input from whoever they want, but in the end the decision is theirs on how to proceed. Koritz lays out the options from a models to follow like Farmer City or Logan County or go into the business themselves, but he notes there are logistical problems with each model.

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So what are some of those logistical problems? He says the major problem is there is property of the taxing district on the eastern side of Farmer City, not covered by the Farmer City Fire Protection District.

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Another obstacle the Board faces is money. The tax money the County levies will not be received until after the the December 31 deadline to have a service in place. Pete Daugherty raised the question of, whoever the provider becomes, how are they going to get money and when will they get the money?

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The board used the example of the Logan County model of a non-profit service, and Farmer City's model, to answer the financial question. Getting enough money to operate a service will fall all the way down to the provider that steps up wanting to provide an ambulance service to DeWitt County.

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The DeWitt County Board has a lot of work ahead, but all indications are by Board Chair Melonie Tilley and other DeWitt County emergency officials, real progress was made Thursday night despite no action being taken.

The County Board made the decision to come back to their regular monthly meeting next Thursday ready to act on what kind of board they would like to have formed and who they would like on that board.

The meeting is next Thursday at 7 pm.