Request By:
Hon. Edward L. Jacobs
Attorney at Law
7 Highland Plaza
654 Highland Avenue
Fort Thomas, Kentucky 41075
Opinion
Opinion By: Steven L. Beshear, Attorney General; Walter C. Herdman, Asst. Deputy Attorney General
This is in response to your recent letter in which you, on behalf of the city of Union, a city of the sixth class, raise the following questions concerning an emergency ambulance service district:
"Whether a sixth class city, not within a county containing a first class city can create an emergency ambulance service district under KRS 108.100 or KRS 108.105?
If a sixth class city does create an emergency ambulance service district under chapter 108 of the Kentucky Revised Statues, is that emergency ambulance service district subject to the provisions of chapter 216B of the Kentucky Revised Statutes?"
Our response to your initial question would be in the affirmative pursuant to KRS 108.080(4) as amended in 1982 which is the definition section pertaining to emergency ambulance service districts. Subsection 4 defining "city" to mean an incorporated city of any class authorizes a sixth class city to establish such district pursuant to KRS 108.100. Prior to the 1982 amendment, the term "city" was defined to mean an incorporated city of any class in counties containing a city of the first class. Thus the city of Union, a sixth class city, may establish a ambulance protection district under the referred to act.
In response to your second question, all ambulance services must now be licensed by the Certificate of Need Licensure Board unless they offer no health services. Prior to a 1982 amendment to KRS 216B.020, the fiscal court was authorized to exempt county ambulance services from the provisions of Chapter 216B KRS. However, the 1982 amendment omitted this authorization. Of course no ambulance service needs a certificate of need under the terms of KRS 216B.020(1) but on the other hand a license is required as previously mentioned.