Audit is Clean
Taylor, Polson & Company’s Jeff Carter reviewing the audit with the board. Photo | PJ Martin
By PJ Martin
Editor
The Herald-News
The Ambulance Service Corporation, Inc. Board of Directors met on Wednesday, June 26th, at the Community Center at the TJ Health Pavilion.
The meeting was called to order and a roll call was performed with the following individuals present: Judge/Executive Jamie Byrd, Garland Gilliam, Ervin Sorrell, Dr. Neil Thornbury, and Phillip Geralds. Also in attendance were Attorney Brian Pack, Executive Director Joe Middleton, Executive Secretary/Treasurer Shawn Estes, and from The Herald-News, PJ Martin.
A quorum was present.
The minutes from the April 23, 2025, meeting were reviewed and approved with no changes.
Audit
Taylor, Polson, & Company PSC representative Jeff Carter presented the audit report for FY 2023-2024 as an unmodified or clean opinion.
Carter added, “Your total liabilities decreased from 13.9 to 9.5 and your deferred inflows, which is income related to the pensions, increased from 2.8 to 5.3 what that really is showing us is that the pension, which again comes with the state, is actually doing better performance now than what it has done over the last few years.”
“I’m making a suggestion that y’all need to review your capitalization policy… But we recommended that you move it to a minimum of $5,000.”
Finance Report
Executive Director Joe Middleton turned the meeting over to Executive Treasurer/ Secretary Shawn Estes, who presented the finance report for April with adjusted receipts of $544,795 and adjusted expenses of $592,056, leaving a net income loss of $47,261 for April. Estes added, “We should be tracking at 83.33% of our budget, and we’re below that at 82.3% for the month.”
In May, there were adjusted receipts of $544,991 and adjusted expenses of $558,535 for a loss of income of $13,544. He added, “We should be tracking 91.67% of our budget. We’re below that at 90.7%.”
Part of the reason for the loss was noted as May having 5 payrolls. The April and May finance reports were approved.
Operations Reports
Executive Director Joe Middleton presented the operations report by calendar year, “YTD is 3,324 runs for Barren County, 581 runs for Metcalfe County. That’s a total of 3,905 runs with an increase of 3.7%.”
April saw a total of 943 runs, and May had 970 runs. The fiscal YTD (June 30, 2024, to present) is 10,339 runs.
Middleton also presented the response report sorted by Fire Dept. District and volume by each BMEMS Station in the attached chart.
Run volume by fire district and by station. Chart provided by the Ambulance Service Corporation
Middleton then presented the Operational Summary as shown in the attached chart. He explained that the ED turnaround time is the time spent with the patient in the ER waiting for them to be taken by the staff.
Chart provided by the Ambulance Service Corporation
Clinical Report
Middleton reported the results of training. “We have two people in the advanced EMT immersion program. They are moving along very quickly, and then we just successfully completed one in the basic commercial program.”
“We have taken applications for our next EMT basic immersion program. At close of application, we had 36 candidates who were interested in the potential of four positions.”
“Our goal was to try to make this EMT emergency program as competitive as could be, and basically the purpose of it is to start training and educating our own internal ultimately, speaking, we’re hopeful that the basic program, yields people into the advanced program, which is going to yield people into the paramedic program.”
Old Business
Middleton also advised the board about the new response vehicles. “Just want to let the board know that the new response vehicles, they are in and they are fully equipped. They are in service. And if anybody wants to take a look at one, Miss. Fauci has one here tonight. Feel free to take a look at that.”
New Business
As advised by the auditor, the Capital Expenditure Policy was reviewed and, having not been updated since the 70s, the criteria were approved to increase the criteria to $5,000 or more.
Middleton requested to surplus the 2018 Dodge Ram. The intent is to possibly sell it to Enterprise. The request was approved.
A Request for Proposal (RFP) was reviewed by Attorney Brian Pack, who deemed it well written, for a professional audit service for the fiscal year ending June 30, 2025. The auditor would need to work with the Ambulance Service Corporation, Inc., and with the Barren County Special Purpose Ambulance Taxing District.
The purpose of the RFP is to locate a qualified, capable firm that can provide a high-quality audit service in a timely manner.
With no other business, the meeting adjourned.
The next meeting is scheduled for August 27, 2025, at 4 p.m. in Barren County.
