Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SATURDAY, July 23, 1994                   TAG: 9407260055
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: C-5   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: WINDSOR                                LENGTH: Medium

TOWN TELLS RESCUE SQUAD TO BUY LOCALLY BUILT VEHICLE

The Windsor Town Council voted last week to withhold $5,000 in its budget from the Windsor Volunteer Rescue Squad to give the organization a chance to reconsider spending $63,000 for an ambulance that a company just down the street said it would build for $57,000.

``There's been a public outcry against the actions of the squad,'' said Robert Claud, mayor of the Isle of Wight County community of about 1,000 residents.

Earlier this month, the rescue squad decided to buy a new ambulance from Med Tech Inc., an Indiana company, rather than Robinson Body Works and Ambulances in Windsor.

Tommy Robinson, whose family-run shop sits along U.S. 460 less than a mile from the rescue squad building, said ``I don't know'' when asked why his bid was rejected. ``I thought I had it, but I got surprised,'' he said.

Town leaders also were stunned.

``I've been disappointed that the squad would go as far as they did toward seriously considering a purchase for more money out of town,'' Claud said.

Ricky Hardy, captain of the rescue squad, referred questions to Bill Sizemore, the squad's president. Sizemore did not return a telephone call left at his home Friday.

Rescue squad officials indicated to Claud and Robinson that the preference for Med Tech, at least in part, involved warranty considerations.

The Ford Motor Co. has guidelines for modifying a Ford chassis to build an ambulance and a certification program for shops that do such work.

Robinson, who builds about a dozen ambulances a year for rescue units in Virginia and the Carolinas, said he follows those guidelines but has not been certified, a condition required for the Ford warranty.

Of the approximately 60 ambulance builders in the United States and Canada, about half are certified by Ford's Qualified Vehicle Modifier program, said John Ochs, a Ford spokesman. They do about 80 percent of the ambulance business in the two countries, he said.

The program, set up in the 1980s by Ford to cope with a problem of ambulance fires, sets standards for materials such as heater hoses and wiring used by shops that convert vans and trucks into ambulances.

``We feel the user gets a higher quality and safer vehicle if it meets our safety standards,'' Ochs said.

But the cost difference still bothers town officials.

``There just didn't appear to be sufficient justification to go out of the area, particularly to pay more,'' Claud said. ``If you're going to get the same quality, you ought to spend your money locally.''

The day after the council voted unanimously to withhold some of the rescue squad's funding, the squad called a meeting of its advisory committee to discuss reconsidering the purchase. A decision is expected next month.

``There's still time for things to be resolved,'' the mayor said. ``No purchase has actually been made.''

Robinson, who has seven employees in his shop, hopes he gets another chance.

``They have set up a ton of hurdles in front of me, and I have cleared every one,'' he said. ``I told them many times I was just right down the street from them, and I want to put my ambulance in their building.''