COLLIER COUNTY, ON FLORIDA’S WEST COAST, has come up with a novel approach to cutting public safety budgets.  They are eliminating emergency ambulance service to areas that don’t generate enough calls to make it worth while to go there.

Photo by Nick Shirghio

They have already stopped responding to two small communities, Golden Gate City and Naple Manor, and now they are planning to discontinue service to Ave Maria University campus and Isles of Capri.

Janet Vasey, a member of Collier County’s “Productivity Committee,” explains:

“There are very few calls for Ave Maria.  There’s just not enough people requiring service at this time, and likewise in Isles of Capri. They only have calls once every 3 days or so.” 

She did not say whether the severity of the emergencies had any bearing on this decision. 

While the county expects the abandoned areas to be covered by mutual aid responses from other ambulance services that are farther away, Vasey believes that Collier County would save a million dollars a year by letting their citizens lay in the street for another 15 minutes or so until help arrives from outside.

This is not going over so well with a couple of the county commissioners.  “I don’t think any amount of savings could replace the damage that could be done,” said Commissioner Donna Fiala.  Likewise, Commissioner Jim Colletta says, “You have to provide for the health safety and welfare above everything else.”

WBBH Ch. 2 has the STORY and gives this video report:

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