MOORPARK : Ambulance Service to Be Ballot Issue

The Moorpark City Council has agreed to ask voters whether taxes should be raised to establish a municipal ambulance service.

Council members voted 4 to 1 earlier this week to approve the idea of using a special tax to finance a proposed ambulance service for Moorpark residents. They plan to take the proposal to a vote in November.

Moorpark City Atty. Cheryl Kane said a municipal ambulance service would cost about $700,000 to establish, $200,000 more than the estimate provided last week by Councilman Clint Harper.

If the measure is approved by voters, it would be the first time that taxpayers in Ventura County paid directly for ambulance service. Ambulance service for the 10 cities and unincorporated areas of Ventura County is managed by the county Emergency Medical Services Agency.

Dr. Larry Dodd, medical director of the county agency, said Thursday that he had not been notified by Moorpark officials but planned to look into the measure they plan to put before voters.

“It’s an idea, but it needs a lot of development . . . regarding its feasibility,” Dodd said.

The council for months has sought ways to improve ambulance service for Moorpark residents after some residents complained that emergency crews took up to half an hour to respond to accident calls.

Some council members contend that the private company contracted by the county to provide ambulance service is too slow because the station it dispatches from is located about two miles outside Moorpark on Olsen Road. They want to open an ambulance station inside the city boundaries.

The company agreed last week at the request of the council to reduce its 15-minute response time by five minutes.

Mayor Bernardo Perez said a favorable vote on the measure next fall would provide the means for paying for a new station. But city officials have not decided whether it will set up its own station, manned by its own emergency crews, or allow the county to establish one, he said.

Councilman Paul Lawrason, who opposed the decision, said creation of an independent tax authority to raise money for ambulance services could expose Moorpark to legal action from the county or from Pruner Ambulance Co. of Thousand Oaks, the only ambulance operator in the eastern part of Ventura County.

Lawrason said that a two-member committee made up of Harper and Councilwoman Eloise Brown failed to look at alternatives to raising taxes.

“We might find there are alternatives that are not nearly as expensive as establishing our own system,” Lawrason said.

The City Council hurriedly scheduled a special session Saturday to adopt a resolution calling for a vote.