A few years ago, I lived in Alexandria, La., where I worked for The Town Talk as the sports editor. I also wrote a few non-sports for the publication and what’s going on here in Central West Virginia brought back some memories.
I remember writing one about EMT/ambulance services.
Rapides Parish, where Alexandria is located, is in the central part of the state on the banks of the Red River. It is said that south of the Red River is Cajuns and Catholics while north of the river it is protestants and cowboys, and the truth of the matter is that is pretty accurate.
You know how Louisiana looks a bit like a boot well Alexandria is about when the ankle bone would be.
Enough of a geography lesson.
At the time the Rapides Parish Police Jury (Louisiana’s version of a county commission) was debating whether to fold its EMS service and award a contract to Acadian Ambulance to exclusively provide ambulance services. Both Rapides EMS and Acadian provided services in the parish
At that time Rapides Parish was the only parish south of the Red River to not have awarded an exclusive contract to Acadian Ambulance since it had not shut down its local squad.
Rapides Parish also had the cheapest ambulance rates in the state at the time because of the competition between the two services.
My column at the time was against shutting down the local ambulance service because if they shut it down ambulance rates would go up.
It had nothing to do with Acadian not providing a good service because it did provide a good service as was an extremely well-run and respected service. It also had nothing to do with contacting Acadian since that company was in Lafayette which is a mere 90 miles south on I-49.
No, it had nothing to do with any of that it had to do with nothing more than good business practices of competition and local control.
Eventually the police jury did shut down the local ambulance service and guess what – rates went up. A lot. And the citizens of Rapides Parish no longer had a voice in how things were run.
It was a step down a slippery slope.
Here in Calhoun County, we took a step down that slippery slope a while back when the Town of Grantsville decided to close its trash department and allow Waste Management to take over.
So far it has been OK with only a slight rise is costs to the individual customer. But part of that may be because of competition in other locations in the area-wide pickup area — competition seems to have that effect.
The newest give away (sale) the town is considering is selling the water department to West Virginia Water, a company headquartered in Germany with local offices in West Virginia. The town says this needs to be done because the citizenry of Grantsville balked at a 60 per cent rate hike asking for the state’s public service commission (PSC) to step in and take a look.
So, failing to go with a huge rate hike the town threatened instead to sell the water company to West Virginia Water. It basically is some kind of a threat that unless people do what they say something worse will happen.
That’s just wrong.
What should happen is that any decision on the water problems of the town should be tabled until after next year’s town election when the new city government will have an opportunity to work on the problem. It’s only fair, and the people of Grantsville and both public service districts the water plant supplies – Mount Zion and Pleasant Hill – should demand that is what happens.
There is a town council meeting scheduled for Monday at 6 p.m. at the city building and I think people affected by this should show up en masse to demand that they have the final say in what happens with the water department.
It is your right and responsibility so be there.
HACKED: I guess one of my Facebook profiles may have been hacked recently because one of my friends contacted me asking if this plan I suggested for them to make money actually worked.
What plan I asked?
You didn’t recommend a plan?
Uh, no.
They told me I must have been hacked so I posted a thing saying I may have been hacked.
Wow!!! Almost immediately I got a bunch of people who I had never heard of telling me about services that could fix things for me. Clean my profile up and get rid of the hacker.
Those were the clowns that hacked me now trying to help me for a fee of course.
I turned them all in to Facebook and blocked them.
I thought if they looked into my finances, and they really cared they would start a Go Fund Me page for me instead of asking for money so I am guessing they are just trying a quick hit and rob instead of a deep financial dig.
At least I hope so.
Either way life will go on.
WILL JUSTICE BE SERVED: With all the sham trials of President Donald Trump going on you sometimes have to wonder will justice be served, or will he lose one of these trials?
While I obviously hope he doesn’t lose any of the sham trials I am not sure that the democrats and the “mainstream” media haven’t become his best campaign issues since Joe Biden has been out on the campaign trail alone and he has screwed up royally going so far as to say his Uncle Bosie was eaten by cannibals.
Cannibals?
Good grief even for Lyin’ Joe Biden that was one heckuva stretch and even the lying “mainstream” media couldn’t cover up that one.
Keep talking Joe …
As a result, President Trump is cheered when he goes out on the streets of New York where the common man loves him while Biden is mostly ignored wherever he goes.
And President Trump has soared in the polls.
There is still a lot of time between now and November, but it looks as if the democrats’ persecution of President Trump is failing badly.
Until next time stay safe but don’t live life in a bubble.
Great writing. Love it,right to the point. Tks