About SRPAS

By 1974, Cherokee Village was approaching 20 years of existence, with a population of about 2,000 residents. Many of the Village's residents were from populated areas where rapid, professional emergency services were considered a fact of life. Although Cherokee Village's fire department had been founded several years earlier, the residents of this area depended on services from outside the area, or even funeral homes, for their emergency medical needs.

Modern emergency medical services, of the type we appreciate today, had its beginnings in the 1960's. By 1974 several of the community's residents had recognized the need for ambulance service in this area. As stated in a February 1985 Cherokee Villager article, in October of 1974, "12 people were appointed by Desiree Meyer, President of the P.O.A., and charged with the task of organizing an ambulance service."

Cherokee Village Ambulance Service was incorporated in January 1975, and began operations in March. Fourteen thousand dollars was available from fundraising efforts to purchase the service's first fully equipped ambulance. A second ambulance was purchased in the service's second year, and in 1976, the Quorum Court contributed $2,000 for the services to cover the north half of Sharp County.

In the beginning, the Cherokee Village Ambulance Service answered about 15 calls per month. By the mid-1980's about 50 to 60 calls per month were typical. The service now responds to about 350 calls per month.

Training has always been an important aspect of the service's operation. The first EMT class in Arkansas was taught in Ash Flat in 1974. Since then, around 25 EMT classes of various levels have been taught, and many hundreds of hours of continuing education have been conducted for the Service's medical personnel.

Many important milestones have been reached. In 1991, CVAS became an Enhanced Basic Life Support Service. Two years later the Service upgraded to an Intermediate level license. The final upgrade came in 1995 when the Service became a fully paid service at the Paramedic level — the highest level of license generally available to ambulance services in the state. In 1991, Cherokee Village Ambulance Service was honored as Ambulance Service of the Year for the state of Arkansas, and the next year was named national EMS Service of the Year.

Although the service had covered much of the north part of Sharp County since very early in its history, in 1999 a name change to Spring River Paramedic Ambulance Service officially recognized its regional nature.

In July 2006, SRPAS began covering the area formerly served by Life Care EMS of Cave City, expanding its area to include all of Sharp County. In 2006, our local hospital closed its doors. The next several years were a rough time for our service. In 2013, our board of directors faced a hard decision: change the way we do business, or close the doors. Many changes were made.

In 2014, White River Medical Center opened the first satellite ER in Arkansas in the heart of our county — known as MCED (Medical Complex Emergency Department). This greatly changed the type and volume of calls we respond to, and healthcare in our county has greatly improved.

In April of 2015, after serving on the board of directors at Spring River Ambulance since 2010 and volunteering as acting General Manager since 2013, Bart Schulz — NREMT — was hired as full time General Manager. Bart Schulz is still serving in this position today.

Since July 2016, we have had 3 or 4 ALS crews and at times a BLS crew. Our system is versatile and adapts to the needs of our community. Our crews are based throughout the county — Hardy, Cherokee Village, Ash Flat and Cave City — to reduce time-to-patient. We have also forged strong working relationships with services in surrounding areas, such as Vital Link, Pro Med and Fulton County EMS.