Patrick County’s Station 8 hasn’t marked its first anniversary yet, but is providing services to residents and alleviating the burden on volunteer squads, even as one member of the Patrick County Board of Supervisors calls for a halt to the program.

Lock Boyce, of the Mayo River District, has recommended a halt to the paid service due to the expense.

In May 2017, the Patrick County Board of Supervisors earmarked $350,000 to create the paid service, both to make sure residents received help when needed and to backup other rescue squads and fire departments in the county. All are independently owned, operated and staffed primarily by volunteers.

The county’s first career crews began answering calls on Feb. 20, 2018. By early January 2019, the squad had responded to more than 700 calls for medical services, according to Steve Allen, coordinator of Patrick County Emergency Services.

“That’s a whole lot more calls than we expected,” Allen said.

Station 8 crews also respond to fire calls, and in the same time frame responded to nearly 100 fire calls, Allen said. They also responded nearly 30 calls to provide assistance to outside agencies, including state and local law enforcement and other first responders.

The squad includes eight full-time employees and 10 part-time employees.

Full-time employees work four, 24-hour shifts, Allen said, adding that the career crews respond to calls night and day.

Part-time employees work only in the absence of a full time employee, he said, adding that is mainly during vacation, sick days and the like.

“If we can’t get one of the part-time people to work, I fill in,” Allen said. “I filled in twice in December” when regular employees had to take time off and a part-time person was unable to work.

Allen said he also looks for other ways to alleviate the burden on volunteer squads.

For example, after the local hospital closed, volunteer squads were required to travel to Sovah Health- Martinsville to switch out drug boxes before responding to another call.

Now, filled boxes are housed in the squad building, which is centrally located in Stuart.

“We switch out the drug boxes for the volunteer squads and then we go to Martinsville,” saving the volunteer squads time and other valuable resources, while allowing them to respond to other calls faster, Allen said.

The career service also houses and loans medical equipment to residents in need, Allen said of the additional program that was developed at no cost to the county.

The equipment that is available to loan was donated to the agency from residents and others, and “we loan it at no charge, everything from hospital beds, wheel chairs, walkers, bed side toilets and lift chairs,” Allen said.

Allen has said the service would not pay for itself, but would use revenues from soft billing to help offset expenses.

In fiscal 2017-18 — the county spent $132,878.87 to provide the service, according to records from Donna Shough, finance officer.

In the current fiscal year, which is set to end on June 30, the county has spent $231,059.93 on the service, records showed.

In spite of the naysayers, the overall support for the program is evident, according to Allen. He added

“I know what we’re doing is right,” both for volunteers and those in need of services.