Sometimes you have to do what’s right for the town.

That means even if you have to agree that things can’t always be the way you want them to be.

I would think that by now most of us would understand that Rumford is not an Island. We have to look for ways to reach out to others communities to meet our needs. We have to work together with other communities and not just try to dictate to them. For some in our Town, that continues to be quite difficult.

If our selectmen think that they can provide Ambulance coverage cheaper, or better, than they might be justified in this holdout with Med-Care. They can’t. After we provide 2 new trucks, retain some paramedics, pay for their ongoing training and find a place to house them ourselves, we will be paying considerable more than we are now, even with the new building and we will be receiving less service. We can’t provide better service in our small town that Med-Care does with the resources they have.

BTW, what’s the time frame for doing this? Have we just put our citizens at risk?

I believe our Selectmen need to work together with other communities and not just think we can dictate to them, as we are clearly trying to do with the Med-Care situation. I encourage our citizens to call their Selectmen and ask them to sign the Inter-Local Agreement and then work with the other towns to amend the Inter-Local agreement if they want to. All the communities collaborated to create the Inter-Local agreement, we can surely collaborate to modify it.

Ask our Selectmen to make sure that they put the safety of our citizens first.

More Med-Care

In case anyone isn’t sick of reading about Med-Care, we decided to throw one more opinion out there. After much reading, talking and thought, the thing that seems painfully obvious is that the inter-local agreement is flawed. I know what you’re thinking. It’s “No kidding!”

The Sun Journal made for some interesting reading today, both in the story and the comments. Some comments were well thought out and some were…well, anyway. Probably the best post was from Jeff R who said

“….I Support Our Town And agree That Med-Care is an excellant service but think
the "building" should be brought in front of the voters. I also believe strongly
that Amendments need to be made to inter local that caps spending. Med-Cares
board of Directors ignored a Member town who has stated over and over they
disapprove of the building. Thats a slap in the face Without the assualt charge.
I want to thank The Ambulance commitee for there time again and all of you who
are attending these meetings its great to see the involvment in your Town.”

I don’t know Jeff R but I think he summed things up pretty well. We have a problem when an entity that relies on town tax money can spend whatever they want and not allow the town more say. Granted towns do have some say through our town representatives on the board. This situation has made it painfully obvious that isn’t enough when it comes to big ticket items.

I want to give some credit to Steve Brown who spoke to the Sun Journal in an article on Tuesday. He took a little heat off Dean but he still missed the boat when he didn’t talk about why the need for the building was so critical. Instead he talked about the number of jobs potentially lost and deadlines. For those of you who want to throw Dean under the proverbial ambulance, give the guy a break. He’s just doing his job. EVERYONE at Med-Care seems to be missing the big picture here. If you want the towns to spend 2 million dollars, you better tell us why and keep telling us. In fairness to Med-Care, they did have some information about the building on their website but when I looked for it today it was gone.

I would encourage our selectmen to hasten to find the best way to correct the Inter-Local Agreement without jeopardizing the quality ambulance service Med-Care provides and scaring our citizens half to death along the way. That seems to be the most responsible way out of this mess.

Med-Care's new building: To be or not to be...

Long ago the debate over the plans for Med-Care’s new building turned away from why this new building was necessary and why town people should support it. The argument for the building has seemed to center around how towns will financially suffer if they don’t support the building, leaving community members feeling that the cost of the building is being pushed down their throat and without seeing much merit for the building. This has left community members feeling bullied instead of persuaded; a feeling townspeople are bound to react poorly too.

Med-Care’s Board Members have been steadfast in their decision to go forward with plans for a new building despite the rising opposition to the plan. We have yet to hear from any of these board members why they feel so strongly. Instead, Dean Milligan has been the point man, bringing stinging criticism and personal attacks his way.

Dean Milligan is a great paramedic, a wonderful father and a fine citizen. He is now in an unenviable situation and from here it seems that Med-Care’s Board of Directors are content with letting him sit out there in the public spotlight, taking the heat. It seems way past time for Med-Care Board Members to step up to explain why this building is important for our towns. In the absence of that, there is a very good chance Rumford will risk voting down the inter-local agreement also, with ramifications we all can’t be entirely sure of.