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Tomi Grote's avatar

Thank you David, for your compliment and thoughtful post. I do not disagree with anything you said regarding EMS. However, I think a temporary, two-year, renewable levy is in the best interests of the electorate. As you say, government can be mighty unresponsive, especially if funding is in their hands.

As I've mentioned in the posts, there are other forces at work, including an initiative being kicked around the legislature to get the state into the EMS funding game. It's not being taken seriously so far, but I have enough experience with how the legislature operates to know that can turn on a dime. There are just too many variables in play here to make me comfortable approving a permanent, single solution to a problem that can be managed a better way.

We don't need to solve this forever today. We need to work together toward a funding mechanism that is responsive. I don't know exactly what you mean by "other solutions" but I think you know what you are talking about and that they are out there. I do not think EMS has done an effective job of communicating with the public. They gripe that we never come to their meetings or visit them at their firehouses. But it is not the job of the public to come to them. It's the other way around. One of the reasons I started this Substack was to be a platform that will help us quit talking past each other and help us talk with each other. We'll see how that goes. I, for one, am willing to risk another six months of the status quo to see if we can achieve that. Cheers! Tomi

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Tomi Grote's avatar

No, you are not wrong, Jean. But like everything in this world, there's a broader context to consider. You are not the first person to write me with the idea of using the hospital tax for EMS. But, legally, it's not practical. It is tough, but possible to dissolve the hospital taxing district. But there is no way to commandeer those funds for EMS. Funds can't be transferred from one taxing district to another, for good reason. There may be other ways to do it, but the most straightforward would be to first dissolve the hospital district and then the EMS district could ask the voters to approve a similar appropriation for them. That would require a vote and the voter would have a choice to agree or disagree. I will be doing a series on the MMH hospital district, so stay tuned. One of the reasons I'm in favor of two-year tax levy funding for EMS instead of the permanent override they are asking for, is this very thing. The landscape for medical services in this county continues to be in such flux that the straight jacket of a permanent tax on anything is going to get a fight from me. Cheers and thanks for reading! —Tomi

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