CHARLESTON, W.Va. — Officials hope to make significant positive change within the Kanawha County Ambulance Authority after a reshuffling of the organization’s leadership last month.
KCEAA has experienced strife in recent months following the death of John Lucas, an Elkview man who was struck and dragged by an ambulance, in April and the resignation of executive director Monica Mason in May.
Alyssa Middleton, the 19-year-old ambulance driver, faces charges of voluntary manslaughter, aggravated vehicular homicide, and leaving the scene of an accident causing death related to Lucas’s death.
The organization’s board of directors appointed county commissioner Lance Wheeler to replace Mason. Board members hope that Wheeler can provide stability and improve the ambulance authority’s finances.
“The two biggest issues—number one was budgetary and number two was recruitment and retention—so the goal was to get somebody who really understood budgets,” Kanawha County Commission President Ben Salango said Thursday on 580 Live with Dave Allen.
Salango believes that cleaning up the KCEAA budget will resolve the recruitment and retention issue. Plans call for better compensation for first responders once the authority’s finances stabilize.
“If we can cut expenses and if we can increase revenues, then that money is going to the paramedics and the EMTs. That is going to help with your recruitment and retention problem,” Salango said.
Early results seem to show positive development, according to Salango, with Wheeler overseeing operations and Deputy Director Jason Sergent taking charge on the ambulance authority’s clinical aspects. Salango reports progress already on financial reform.
“We took two people to make sure that the ambulance authority is improving, and what we’ve seen so far, and Lance has only been there a couple of weeks, is he’s already saving money,” Salango said.
Salango stressed the importance of making sure that first responders receive pay that is requisite for the duties they are being asked to fulfill. He wants to make sure that action is taken in the right way.
“It is a hard job. There is no way in the world that I would want to ride in the back of an ambulance and see what they see and deal with what they deal with, but to get people to do that, you have got to make sure that they are paid fairly,” he said.
The Kanawha County Commission will name a replacement to finish Wheeler’s term in the near future.