Mayor George Flaggs Jr. said Warren County officials will receive an itemized bill for 366 unbilled ambulance runs made into the county.

The Vicksburg Fire Department provides ambulance and emergency medical service to residents outside the city limits under an agreement between the city and the county.

The city and county signed a new agreement in late September county administrator John Smith said.

On Nov. 9, the Board of Supervisors received an unitemized bill from the city totaling $109,800 for 366 previously unbilled ambulance calls at $300 per run from October 2015 to June 2016 discovered during a recent audit of the ambulance runs by the city. The bill involves runs made under the previous agreement with the county.

County officials said at the time they would not pay the bill without further information.

Flaggs said that information is being prepared by a committee of city attorney Nancy Thomas, accounting director Doug Whittington, fire chief Charles Atkins and deputy chiefs Craig Danczyk and Kenneth Daniels, and city clerk Walter Osborne as a report outlining the times, dates, services and destinations.

“When they are complete, I will present them to the board (of Mayor and Aldermen) and have them approve sending it to the county as a resolution,” he said. He did not say when the report would be ready.

Questions over billing were at the heart of the ambulance service negotiations, at one time forcing county officials to consider hiring a private ambulance company and forming its own rescue unit. The unbilled runs were one of the reasons the supervisors considered going to a private company, Smith said, because of the potential cost of the unbilled runs based on what the county’s 911 records showed.

“Our people looked at the number of runs (from the city) versus what 911 dispatched,” county administrator John Smith said. “There was a big discrepancy between what the city was billing us and what 911 dispatch was showing; 911 was more.

“Our people were telling us the city was making a big error, and that’s what got all this.”

Smith said the city bills the county quarterly for ambulance service, and has billed the county for all four quarters has billed the county for all four quarters based under the new ambulance agreement rate of $350 per run.

“They must be reconciling their numbers to 911 now, because they are a lot larger. They got started and did an audit, and that’s where they’re going back to the three quarters they billed us. That’s where we are. They just have to give more information.”

That’s what Flaggs said the city has done.

“We’re matching the runs with 911 calls,” he said. “These are all calls left before the new contract came in.”

Board of Supervisors president Richard George said the board won’t act until it sees what the city presents.

“When we get the supporting data dealing with the invoice, we’ll go from there,” he said. “We’re no different from anybody else. You get a bill, you’d like to know what it’s for. It’s just a matter for our records and to verify to the public.”