Freezing Rescue Corp. funds a good place to start

Talk about your doctors, lawyers and Native American chiefs.

We had ‘em all at that remarkable meeting on Thursday in the Professional Development Room at the Hanson School.

Plus a rare public sighting of his Rescueness/Selectmanness, assistant chief Jason Cole, and her eminence, the Rescue Chief, herself, sitting beside her man.

It was all very cozy.

No one yelled, no one ever raised their voice. On the contrary, one could hardly hear what Jason Cole was saying half the time as he spoke oh so softly with auditors, selectmen and such.

Interestingly, most people watching the videos produced by town residents Becky Batchelder and Chip Harlow and posted on Youtube would think Jason Cole was the Rescue Chief, not Samantha Cole, who let her man do most of the talking.

With the Coles’ whispering, people were sitting forward in their chairs straining to hear so purposefully we were half expecting someone would fall off their seat onto the floor.

Not to worry, there were a couple of fully qualified EMTs at the ready to help you, I’m sure. Of course you might have to chip in a couple of bucks for gas to the emergency room.

It seems the self-funded Rescue Department is, well, totally broke.

And if it’s broke, you gotta fix it.

Selectmen Karen Gerrish and Ben Thompson are trying to do just that, but it takes picking up the pieces and going back to square one as far as funding goes.

What’s most disturbing is that for some time now, the town has been subsidizing the Rescue Department as it financially founders.

The assets held by the Lebanon Rescue Department Corporation in the form of subscription money and donations should probably be seized until Lebanon taxpayers are repaid for all the money that has gone to keep Rescue afloat against their wishes and in violation of that June referendum three years ago.

We all love the town’s Community Festival that the Rescue Department puts on every spring just before voting time, but do we really want them doling out Rescue Department Corporation money for carnival attractions when we’re footing the bill to keep gasoline and medical supplies in the ambulance and pay the salaries of Rescue volunteers?

When the Rescue Department was basically privatized three years ago, there was supposed to be no public money involved.

If no public money were being used to run Rescue, I’m sure we as residents probably wouldn’t care how the Rescue Department Corporation spent its money.

But that’s not the case.

Bottom line: All Rescue Department Corporation money should be seized or at least frozen until the current fiscal mess is resolved.