One-time cash advance only delays day of reckoning for SEOEMS

The Athens County Commissioners voted Wednesday to advance $154,000 to the Southeast Ohio Emergency Services District, to help keep it afloat financially through this month. The money will help pay off bills owed to the Internal Revenue Service and a state pension fund.

 

 

The other two SEOEMS counties, Lawrence and Jackson, will vote today (Thursday) and Friday respectively, on whether they also will contribute money to the effort – Lawrence $154,000, and Jackson $77,000. (This would raise $385,000, split 40-40-20 among the three counties.)

Even if the other two counties go along with the plan, however, the one-time infusion of cash will only pay two of the most pressing bills, and is no guarantee that the financially struggling emergency medical services district will continue to exist.

“My suggestion is, let’s give it a shot,” recommended Commissioner Larry Payne, who is the Athens County Commission’s representative on the SEOEMS board. “It’s not going to change anything.”

Payne noted that the bills in question would have to be paid in any event, regardless of what happens to the SEOEMS district. The money will come out of carryover funds from revenue generated by the county’s emergency services levies.

Athens County is already looking into the possibility of forming its own single-county district, and on Wednesday the commission approved formation of an exploratory committee to investigate funding and structure options for such a district.

The plan to advance SEOEMS some short-term money came out of a meeting of the district board in Jackson Tuesday night, held in the wake of reports that the district is facing about a $1 million shortfall in an annual budget of around $8 million, and is teetering on the brink of insolvency.

The meeting attracted around 50 spectators, mostly SEOEMS employees, many of whom are represented by United Mine Workers of America Local 490.

Union President Ann Marie Callebs, fighting back tears, told the board that employees recognize the district is facing a budget crisis and may have to dissolve. She put much of the blame, however, squarely on district management.

“Although our hearts and souls are still with the job, we feel we can no longer weather this storm without an internal change,” she said. By unanimous vote at a recent meeting, Callebs reported, the union declared a vote of no confidence in their headquarters management team. “They all need to go,” she declared.

In response, district Executive Director Eric Kuhn said Wednesday, “I realize there’s a lot of frustration with the uncertainty of jobs.” He insisted, however, that management has made an effort to communicate with workers, “and we hope that the union will work with management, to keep SEOEMS a viable organization.”

If the district can’t continue to exist, she said, the union urges all three member counties to set up their own single-county EMS districts, rather than contracting for emergency services with a private company.

A report provided to the board by Treasurer Jason Stevens gave some details on the district’s current financial problems, which apparently have been in the making for years.

The report attributed the crisis to “the combination of many years of a flawed budget structure in the county contracts and an overestimation of patient payments for the budget year 2010.”

Since 1999, the report stated, all three counties have benefited financially from their SEOEMS contracts, which caps the amount they must pay into the district, leaving the district to cover any cost overruns.

From 1999-2007, it claimed, Athens County was over budget by more than $217,000, Jackson by over $251,000, and Lawrence by over $243,000. “None of these budget overruns have ever been remitted to SEOEMS, so the district has simply ‘absorbed’ these losses of approximately $700,000 over the past decade,” the report added.

While budgets for 2008 and 2009 “appeared mostly level on paper,” the report said, a number of unpaid bills have recently come to light, following the departure of the previous fiscal officer. Many of these bills have been paid, but it has taken a bite out of the district’s budget to do so.

ONE OF THE BIGGEST PROBLEMS is a shortfall in patient payments, according to the report; though the district had expected to collect more than $4.4 million from this source by May, the actual figure, as reported by its bill-collection firm, has been slightly over $1.6 million.

Assuming the district pays all bills over 60 days old and makes payroll, the district is looking at a shortfall of about $330,000 by the end of July, according to the report. This shortfall is what the short-term cash advance from the counties, recommended by Lawrence County after an executive board session of more than two-and-a-half hours, is meant to cover.

Before the board went into executive session, Payne, who chairs the body, told the gathered SEOEMS employees that he sympathizes with their plight, having been employed by Columbia Gas when the company was being bought out, and not knowing if he was going to have a job.

“I know what it’s like to sit and not know what’s going to happen,” he said.

A couple of audience members suggested that it might behoove SEOEMS management to simply let the employees know occasionally that their work is appreciated.

“I have seen these people who work for SEOEMS go at it night and day,” said Jackson County resident Claudia Carter, a former paramedic. “What I don’t see is them getting support from the management… just a pat on the back every once in awhile.”

An Athens County paramedic agreed. “It seems like we don’t get much encouragement,” he said.

IN ADDITION TO THE SHORT-TERM cash advance from the counties, SEOEMS will look into the possibility of selling the handful of radio towers it owns. The district hopes to get $1.7 million to $2.2 million for them, though Payne said Wednesday he’s “skeptical” that they will sell for that much. The three counties are all moving toward reliance on a statewide radio system called MARCS.

A medical transport system called Medflight has volunteered to help sort out SEO- EMS’ budgeting mess, at no cost.

Jackson County Commissioner Jim Riepenhoff warned those at Tuesday’s board meeting that while the board is willing to try to salvage the district, no one should get his hopes up too high. “I will say right now, we are not out of the woods,” he said. “We’re making a step toward keeping this organization going… (but) there is a possibility that it may go.”