News Photo by Crystal Nelson The Alcona County Ambulance Station 1 is pictured here on Wednesday in Harrisville.

HARRISVILLE — Alcona County taxpayers will be asked in the Aug. 4 election to support a property tax increase for the county’s Emergency Medical Services.

The county Board of Commissioners on Wednesday voted unanimously to approve language that will appear on the ballot. Taxpayers are being asked to consider a 0.5-mill increase, which would cost the owner of a $100,000 home about $25 annually over four years.

The tax would be paid in addition to the service’s existing 1-mill tax, which costs the owner of a $100,000 home about $50 each year, so the total ambulance tax would rise to about $75 a year for that homeowner.

The millage is expected to generate $388,331 for the county in its first year. The money would be used to acquire and maintain emergency medical service vehicles, equipment, existing buildings and structures, medical supplies, and inventory.

Alcona County Commissioner Dan Gauthier said the operating millage is no longer enough to cover all of the expenses. He said the county used money from its general fund last year to cover a $170,000 deficit in Emergency Medical Services and the county could not afford to do that again.

“As we know, the 1 mill that has been approved by our voters for many, many years is just no longer enough revenue coming in to support that department,” Gauthier said.

With the exception of the 2016 fiscal year, the ambulance service has spent more than it took in each year since 2014, audits show. During that time, the ambulance service has seen its cash reserves decrease from $846,381 at the beginning of 2014 to $81,487 at the end of 2018 as costs climbed from $1.34 million in 2014 to $1.7 million in 2018.

Gauthier said the additional tax money would not be used to hire more employees, but to address the Emergency Medical Service’s aging fleet of ambulances as well as aging buildings in need of repair.

Two of the service’s ambulances have more than 200,000 miles on them, which county officials said need to be replaced. One of those ambulances has 265,000 miles, which county officials say is over the 250,000-mile industry standard for ambulance replacement.

Two other ambulances have more than 112,000 miles on them.

EMS Director Scott Rice said they had to replace a water heater in both stations in the last three years as well as the furnace at Station 2 in Glennie. Rice said more repairs are needed, including two furnaces at Station 1, where half of the roof is leaking from “normal wear and tear.” The furnaces and the half of the roof are nearly 20 years old. Half of the roof was previously replaced because of wind damage, he said.

Commissioner Carolyn Brummund said Rice inherited old ambulances and an old building when he was hired as the county’s EMS director in 2017.

“If we didn’t have those kinds of costs, we probably could be making it,” Brummund said. “Then you add in new things like roofs and leakage from things and those major costs, but those eat into your day-to-day budget.”

County board Chairman Craig Johnston said he believes it really comes down to the fact that “we are a county that doesn’t have a hospital,” which means the ambulance service has to travel farther.

“I think it’s a great service,” Johnston said. “I think the people of the county expect to have 24-hour EMS service, but, at the same point, it has to be paid for, and it can’t continue to be paid for with flat revenue.”