In addition to providing EMS services to Seminole County starting July 1, Mid Georgia Ambulance extended an offer to Decatur County to provide EMS coverage at no cost to Decatur County taxpayers.

The offer would last 90 days or until Grady EMS, the ambulance service Decatur County signed a contract with in May, became operational.

Decatur County Chairman Frank Loeffler said he had declined the offer.

“It wasn’t something that we needed,” Loeffler said. “Rather than create a lot of confusion, we thanked them for their offer and respectfully declined it.”

Loeffler said with Grady EMS’s HR department arriving next week to conduct interviews with Decatur County EMS employees, it would be awkward and cumbersome to have Mid Georgia trucks running in and out of the EMS Headquarters.

He also noted Decatur County’s ambulances were already in working condition.

“Have we had five of our trucks down, we would have jumped on it,” Loeffler said. “But it just felt like it was going to cause more problems.”

Mid Georgia Director of Public Relations Amy Abel-Kiker said the offer was an attempt to provide the best possible coverage to the entire South Georgia region.

“As the new EMS provider in Seminole County, we feel that it is simply the right thing to do for MGA to offer our readily available resources to aid the citizens of Decatur county, until their newly contracted provider becomes operational,” Abel-Kiker said.

MGA has secured funding through the Community Health Foundation to offer their services in Decatur County in the interim, according to Abel-Kiker.