KINGWOOD, W.Va. –– The Preston County Commission is considering an annual fee to support Advanced Life Support Emergency Medical Services throughout the county.
Preston County Commission President Hunter Thomas said a possible $90 annual fee assessed on living units and would be billed quarterly. Residents receiving the Homestead Exemption or who are disabled would pay a $60 annual fee and additional rebates are available as described in the ordinance.
“It’s $60 per recreational unit per fiscal year and $90 per business unit per fiscal year,” Thomas said on WAJR’s “Talk of the Town.”
The fee is not assessed per building, per parcel or per structure, according to Thomas.
Ambulance service were all volunteers in Preston County until the early to mid 2000s when new requirements ushered in the era of Emergency Medical Services (EMS). Thomas said as the level of service increased, the costs of training, equipment, and operations did as well, but with no help from the state or local government. But there is still a mandate from the state to provide the services to their citizens.
“There’ve been issues ever since then and multiple closures, and to sum it up, emergency medical services are not sustainable in rural America without additional funding coming from somewhere,” Thomas said.
For the first time in history the state legislature passed a bill during this year’s legislative session that provides permanent annual funding through lottery revenues, but Thomas said it’s just too little too late. Lawmakers also passed new reimbursement rates for subsidized transports that help curtail costs, but it’s not enough for the Preston County EMS system.
“We certainly appreciate everything that was done in this last legislative session, but this is an issue that should have been addressed long before I was elected to office,” Thomas said.
Commissioners have approved a series of emergency payments to help meet payrolls and keep the units operating. Thomas said one of those times was the government shutdown in the fall of 2025, when the nonprofits waited weeks for reimbursement that ultimately had to come from the county.
“So, we took quite a few emergency actions to use general county dollars to backfill those agencies until that funding was dispersed from the federal government,” Thomas said.
The EMS problem in Preston County is an ongoing issue that started getting more attention when Tunnelton closed their EMS unit in 2021. The fee discussion has included many different options and iterations, but Thomas said the current draft looks to be their option to date.
“I do think we’re at a point with the current draft that it’s a strong finished draft that could potentially be voted on soon,” Thomas said. “But I could never say for certain when that vote would be taken.”