http://www.tcpalm.com/tcp/local_news/artic...736_5568181,00.htmlTrauma video sparks debate in St. Lucie
By JAMES KIRLEY
jim.kirley@scripps.com
June 3, 2007
ST. LUCIE COUNTY — Anyone doubting there is disagreement over whether county landowners should tax themselves to staff a trauma center at a corporate-owned local hospital might want to turn on the television.
By tuning into the City of Fort Pierce's public access cable channel 27, you can watch a video produced by the American Trauma Society that promotes hospital trauma centers as lifesavers.
But if you tune into St. Lucie County's public cable access channel 21, you won't see the same video — despite the fact that the same people operate both channels.
It's no accident the video, delivered to the station by supporters of Lawnwood Regional Medical Center & Heart Institute's proposed trauma center, got play on one channel and not the other: Station Technical Operations Manager Shane DeWitt said that County Administrator Doug Anderson told him to view the video and report whether it took sides.
DeWitt said he felt it did and Anderson told him not to air the video.
"In my opinion, what we're trying to do is not give the impression that we're pushing (the tax) either way," DeWitt said.
But Fort Pierce Mayor Bob Benton, a longtime supporter of local trauma medical services, told station management to run the video on the city's channel.
"I don't think it is biased," Benton said. "It shows what a trauma center does. If there is another side out there, if that other side comes to me with something, we would show it.
"I'm not going to tell anybody how to vote," he said. "Yes, Bob Benton is going to vote for it."
Billboard and yard signs have gone up across the county promoting a "yes" vote on a June 26 referendum. It would tax up to 25 cents per $1,000 property value, raising up to $7 million a year countywide for salaries for the doctors who will staff the trauma center.
The outdoor ads are being funded by the Citizens for Trauma Care, said Beth Williams, the political committee's treasurer who also is Lawnwood's director of marketing and public relations.
To date, the only organized opposition to the referendum has been from the St. Lucie Association.
"We're making phone calls," said Richard Wilson of Fort Pierce, chairman of the political committee. "We're going to have a membership drive.
"Yes, we know we are running on a tight schedule," he said, noting the vote is less than four weeks away.
The referendum was approved by a 3-2 vote of the County Commission. One of those voting against it was County Commissioner Doug Coward, who said a single-issue special election was not the proper way to poll voters.
Williams said Lawnwood first mentioned the possibility of public funding for its trauma center in spring 2006, at the county's annual strategic planning meeting.
"Then we started talking individually to community leaders," she said. "As we got into the summer (of 2006), people who are community leaders and whose opinions we respect told us that the November (2006) ballot was going to be contentious."
Williams said Lawnwood had wanted to get the referendum on the ballot by March, before winter season ended.
"Time got away from us," she said.
Lawnwood now needs to open its trauma center before Oct. 1, when time will run out on a Florida Department of Health application.
Williams has been busy making presentations promoting Lawnwood's efforts to homeowners associations, service clubs, churches and on radio shows.
A big audience is expected 6:30 p.m. Thursday at the Lincoln Park Recreation Center. The St. Lucie County Ministerial Alliance, Fort Pierce Main Street and local chapters of several fraternities and sororities have organized the event.
The Rev. Robert Coleman, pastor of Goodwill Presbyterian Church in Fort Pierce, said he personally supports a tax for trauma care. He noted that trauma centers save lives, but also that they are not money-makers for hospitals.
"It's a run-in-the-red situation and somebody's got to pick up the tab," said Coleman, who got involved in the issue as vice president of Mustard Seed Ministries.
"Where is the money going to come from?" he added. "That's the million-dollar question. You've got some folks out there already struggling."
PUBLIC FORUM ON TRAUMA TAX
A town hall meeting will take place 6-7:30 p.m. June 11 in St. Lucie County Commission chambers, where the public will be invited to speak its piece on using a new property tax to fund trauma care at Lawnwood Regional Medical Center & Heart Institute in Fort Pierce. The new tax will be placed before county voters in a June 26 referendum. The voting is both requested and funded by Lawnwood.
The event will be broadcast live on St. Lucie County TV (Comcast channel 21) and WPSL 1590 AM radio.
It will be rebroadcast on SLCTV at various times up until the June 26 referendum and WPSL will rebroadcast the forum 7 p.m. June 21.
