24 Hour Staffing of the Lebanon Rescue Department is Not Such a New Idea.

Our Chief of both Rescue and Fire Departments makes $1,200.00 per month.
This is a total of $14,400.00 per year.
That is the same amount that Chief Samantha Cole was paid for running our Rescue Department as approved by the taxpayers of Lebanon for the 2013/2014 Town Budget.
What few people know, was that there was a Budget Request submitted by the Lebanon Rescue Department which would have come before the town in the June 2014 Town Vote.

At the top of the page, obtained through Right to Know access through the Lebanon Town Office, this morning, by asking for the 2014 / 2015 Budget Request by the Lebanon Rescue Department, as you can see, the Chief, at the time, Samantha Cole, was budgeting herself in a hefty raise, which breaks down to $1,333.33 per month. And this was ONLY as the Chief of Lebanon Rescue Department. The Chief of the Lebanon Fired Department was ALSO paid, $14,400.00 per year (or $1,200 per month).

This Budget Request Worksheet was turned in by the Rescue Department Chief on November 14, of 2013, only a month before she, and her Assistant Chief husband resigned their duties amid rumors and scandal. (you can see the date on the bottom center of the page).

On line 2, you can also see a jump in the amount of Volunteer Stipend amounts requested, the difference being $7,000.00.

Since the amount paid to each volunteer per call was not scheduled to go up in amount, why the $7,000 increase??

Well, we found that out too.

For as much attention has been given to the plan that Chief Dan Meehan has worked out with ideas of  having our volunteers and additional qualified per-diem employees staff the Rescue and Fire Departments around the clock, which would hasten response times to incidents, it is, apparently, not a new idea!!

 

 

 

 

This was found posted on the Command Central's own page on January 24, 2013. Clearly the writer of this page is asking local taxpayers to fund a dollar amount to staff our Rescue Department around the clock.

In the wording of this post lifted from the Command Central's page, the writer is saying that it takes an average of 11 minutes to get the ambulance on the road from the station, one would gather that an appropriate response time, depending on where in town the ambulance had to travel, would be between 20 and 30 minutes, which is not unlike the response times we are experiencing as we sit today.

 

 

 

 

I'd also like to call your attention to page 2 of the 2014 / 2015 Rescue Department Budget Request (which I had to post sideways to be able to show you the notations on the far side of the page) where it clearly shows that Sanford's Rescue was charging "ALS" or Advanced Life Support Fees. which would have clearly added an additional $10,000. to the Rescue Department Budget in 2014 / 2015, or another $833.33 per month to the Requested Budget. 

After reading many reports on this all being Chief Meehan's fault that Sanford is charging Advanced Life Support and Paramedic Fees, if Lebanon had such great success with our own town sponsored Paramedics, WHY were we being asked by Chief Cole to budget in $10,000 for Sanford ALS Fees?

Why did we have to budget ALS fees at all if we were paying Paramedics on our own Department??

 

Now, I can hear you asking, "Wait... wouldn't the voters have to approve that increase?" and the answer is YES.

 

So I submit to you, a copy of the Referendum questions presented to the Selectmen on November 14, 2013, one month before the Cole Chief and Assistant Chief stepped down from their positions.

These Referendum questions were  to be added to the June 2014 Town Ballot as Budget Funding Requests by the Lebanon Rescue Department.

 

As you can see, the first Referendum Budget item requested was for $135,800 for the operation of the Lebanon Rescue Station. The second Referendum would have asked for an additional $45,000 for the first payment of a 5 year lease to replace the Lebanon Rescue One Ambulance, stating that the vehicle is "old" and needs to be replaced. The third Referendum would have asked the taxpayers of the Town of Lebanon to vote the sum of $150,000 to staff the Lebanon Rescue Station with at least one Paramedic, EMT or EMS personnel to be able to "quicker respond" with the ambulance 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. With the Budgeted $135,800 request PLUS the ADDITIONAL request for $150,000 for staffing, the total Rescue Budget Request WOULD have been $285,800, which is HIGHER than the budget Chief Daniel Meehan is asking for in HIS Rescue Department Budget a year later, which is $235,605. ($50,195 less than the Cole Family were asking for).

 

I will leave you to make your own conclusions as to why the current writer(s) of the Lebanon Rescue Department - Command Central page is questioning Chief Daniel Meehan's request to staff the Lebanon Rescue Department and the Lebanon Fire Department with around the clock personnel, if it was, indeed, also a Cole family request to do so prior to their resignations being tendered?

 

Again, I submit to you that if you don't believe what you see on The Lebanon Truth Seekers page, you also have the right to go to the Lebanon Town Office and fill out the same Right to Know paperwork and request the proposed budget request by Chief Samantha Cole to the November 11, 2013 Selectmen's Meeting, which was accompanied by the Referendum Question proposal to fund the 24 hour staffing of the Lebanon Rescue Department.