After a record-breaking year of calls, the Clinton Area Ambulance Service finds itself half-staffed, its EMTs overworked and underpaid.
But, some of the municipalities it serves have heard its calls for help and are sending federal COVID relief money its way.
The Clinton Area Ambulance Service services 13 municipalities in the north half of Clinton County. Fully staffed, it would have 35 employees.
Director of Clinton County Ambulance Service Lynn Weber said that right now that number is closer to 15 or 20.
Weber said the lack of drivers has affected ambulance response times, too.
"We have a lot of folks that do this job once in a while just because they want to help, but it's not—they have other jobs that kind of pay the bills," Weber said.
Frankly, it's because they need other jobs to pay the bills.
"When I do exit interviews, the common thread in an exit interview as to why they're leaving, is because they can't afford to stay," Weber said.
What is the cost of saving a life? Weber said EMTs get paid around $13 an hour, and paramedics around $16 an hour.
So why can't they just pay their employees more?
"What we get reimbursed for our calls is so limited," Weber said. "We have some private insurers that pay us okay, but Medicare/Medicaid, even with their boosts, are still short of cost."
Weber said they get reimbursed less than what it costs for about three-quarters of the work they do. That means of the 3,600 calls they had in 2021, they were not fully reimbursed for 2,700 of them.
The city of St. Johns is contributing $20,000 in American Rescue Plan Act money to the service, one of five municipalities to give.
"As they were looking at their budget, what their needs are in respect to staffing today and next year and down the road, they're wanting to make sure they have adequate resources available to actually fund the appropriate staffing levels and maintain those staffing levels going into the future," St. Johns Mayor Eric Hufnagel said. "So, we saw this as a way, collaboratively, to make a good investment."
Weber is optimistic that more municipalities will join the effort.
"Those ARPA funds are going to help us pay down and hopefully pay for this newest ambulance that's coming in," Weber said.
Not to mention, a 20 percent increase in pay for each employee, which they should see in their April paychecks.
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