AMARILLO, TEXAS -- Who will run the city's ambulance service will be on the agenda at this Tuesday's City Commissioners meeting. The city commission will hold a public hearing to hear from the American Medical Response and the Firefighters Union one more time.
The city is faced with two options. Either creates an in-house system with the local Firefighters Union or give the contract to AMR the nations largest ambulance provider.
Mayor Debra McCartt told Pronews 7 "the most important thing is that we get an ambulance service that will provide good service and good response time and be what the city of Amarillo needs over the next many years."
The Firefighters Union has offered to take over the duties but according to officials the system would have to be built from scratch and could cost taxpayers.
"it's going to require a huge amount of revenue to start up a system to buy equipment to undertake training and there are really other ways to better utilize our firefighters then to go into debt and increase tax rate and so I think that's the problems doing it all in house" Commissioner Brian Eades said.
Unfortunately the ambulance service could cost Amarillo tax payers no matter who gets the contract. Depending on the final numbers and presentations at Tuesday's public hearing. Commissioners may decide to go with AMR because of their ability to come on board with everything in place.
"The thing I'm excited about is that we have an ambulance service that has come to us that is prepared ready to go into action on January 17th that has everything in place as opposed to us putting together a plan that will take a long time that will take citizens taxpayer dollars additional dollars that we don't have currently" Mayor McCartt said.
According to AMR officials they offer a long term plan with a fresh fleet of ambulances and a more integrated system across the board.
Commissioners expect to hear the final arguments from both sides and plan to decide the fate of Amarillo's ambulance service at this week's meeting.
