(Audubon) An agreement between Audubon County and the City of Panora has been reached to provide ambulance transfer services.
Supervisor’s Chairman Doug Sorensen reveals it’s a five year contract. “Paul Topliff from the Audubon County hospital has been working on this for nearly a year. He has an arrangement with the City of Panora to provide service to Audubon County for transfers to Des Moines or Omaha, a distance of less than 100 miles, which we lack in Audubon County. All small counties are dealing with this problem.”
Sorensen calls it an economical solution. “It’s kind of a big commitment in a way,” Sorensen says, “In terms of what other counties are doing this is extremely economical. We didn’t have to buy an ambulance and have to staff it. If you have to go that route it’s very, very expensive very, very fast. We kept ourselves out of the ambulance business by partnering with someone else. It’s an economic way to solve a problem.”
The cost is $120,000 per year. The county will cover the full cost for the first year. After year one, the hospital and the county will evenly divide the expense.
