Thirty-five years of STARS service
By Sharon McLeay Times Contributor
Glenda Farnum, STARS senior municipal relations liaison, gave an update on STARS challenges and conquests to Wheatland County council on May 7.
“This year marks STARS serving southern Alberta for 35 years. That is pretty amazing. It is always important as we move forward with new and exciting challenges and that we remember where we came from,” said Farnum.
She presented a short summary of STARS history. The service was developed in the early 1980s because of medical needs identified by the medical community. Dr. Greg Powell, the medical community, the Lions and various business supporters answered that need by funding the first air ambulance and developing medical protocols for air rescue response. The first mission involved the birth of premature twins in Lethbridge. Kelly Waldron, one of the infants, was having life-threatening breathing problems and STARS transported her to the neonatal unit at the Foothills Hospital in Calgary for emergency care.
Since then, the service has expanded to 11 helicopters serving western Canada and flying 40,000 emergency flights to date.
Rural response is a big part of STARS service, so providing critical care training to first responders was a logical extension of their service. They have a motorhome that travels to communities to provide trauma and safe landing training to ground response crews in rural areas.
“We are proud to work with all critical care providers through the chain of survival,” said Farnum.
Eighty per cent of their money comes from fundraising and donations. Municipalities provide per capita funding to be included in STARS service areas.
Wheatland County, including Strathmore, had nine responses by STARS in 2019, and on average 22 calls are called for yearly.
Farnum said the cost for that runs about $160,000. The population in Wheatland County is about 9,000 people, so that would be about $18,000 in donation per year (excluding other municipalities within Wheatland County).
“That’s where I hope you see true value in your area from STARS,” said Farnum. “Your contribution of $2 per capita annually is that piece that helps us absolutely to have a sustainability factor for operations.”
The helicopter fleet must maintain its helicopters to be flight certified. Under its current service record, it was necessary for STARS to consider replacing aging helicopters. It costs about $13 million to replace a helicopter. They are working on an additional fundraising effort to replace older helicopters, one helicopter at a time.
They were fortunate that last December their contract to the Saskatchewan government provided 50 per cent funding for operations in that province and the purchase of one helicopter for use. They have also received a federal grant for $65 million that will go towards replacement efforts. That still leaves $26 million for the foundation to fundraise.