LCS: Commissioners deny ESD 4 ballot placement for second time

For the second straight year, petitioners approached the Palo Pinto Commissioner’s Court with hopes of getting the creation of Emergency Service District 4 on the November election ballot and for the second straight year, the petitioners were denied with the Commissioners voting against the measure in a 4-1 vote.

An Emergency Service District is a political subdivision, like a school district or hospital district, which is formed to provide emergency services like fire or medical care to a community. Palo Pinto County currently has two ESDs and ESD 1 currently provides services to Possum Kingdom Lake’s East side.

Those behind the push for the creation of ESD 4 had envisioned an opportunity for the PK Eastside volunteer fire and emergency medical services department to become more utilized for the East side of Possum Kingdom.

“Realistically, we would like very much to work with ESD 1 and Sacred Cross to have equal coverage contracts,” Erin Humphries, with ESD 4 Political Action Committee, said in a previous interview. “Overlapping contracts are really common with ESDs, Parker County is an excellent example of that. There are multiple ESDs, they have these service contracts and those contracts often overlap. It is not that we are unhappy it is that we want to do more, we want to provide local service with local people for local people.”

The Commissioner’s denied to place the creation of ESD 4 on the ballot last year, because an election was held in 2015 for the creation of an ESD which would have served PK East but failed, and the services are in place with ESD 1 per the statement of services which they issued on July 30, 2018 which was just two weeks before the set public hearing at the Commissioner’s Court. These were the reasons which the court used again in their motion to deny ballot placement this year.

“I was actually really encouraged by what happened in the court on Monday (Aug. 12,)” Humphries said. “Our commissioners were much more engaged and willing to listen, we had an open forum and discussion and were repeatedly recognized by the court to clear up misconceptions and misunderstandings. Though, I don’t love the fact they disallowed the petition, I respect where they are coming from.”

For the rest of the story, see the Wednesday, Aug. 21 edition of The Graham Leader.