The Shock Trauma Air Rescue Service is asking the Town of Slave Lake to contribute annual per capita funding toward its emergency flight operations starting in 2027.
A delegation from STARS, attended town council’s Sept. 8 meeting to present an annual operations report and outline the critical role the air ambulance service plays across northern Alberta. She asked council to consider establishing a steady municipal partnership at a rate of $1 per capita during upcoming 2027 budget deliberations, which amounts to a fixed annual contribution of $6,900 based on local census numbers.
Council voted unanimously to accept the presentation as information and directed administration to bring the $6,900 funding request forward when council begins deliberating the 2027 municipal budget later this year.
During the presentation, the delegation explained that this year marks the 20th anniversary of the STARS Grande Prairie base, which provides dedicated rotary-wing critical care coverage to Slave Lake and surrounding northern communities. Overall, the non-profit organization celebrated its 40th year of operations in Alberta last year, logging more than 66,000 emergency missions over four decades while strictly maintaining its charitable, no-cost-to-patient service model.
Direct operating expenses to run the organization’s three Alberta flight bases in Calgary, Edmonton, and Grande Prairie currently total $38.4 million per year, which works out to approximately $12.8 million per base. The provincial government provides 41 per cent of that annual operating capital through base grant funding of roughly $15.6 million.
The remaining 59 per cent, or $22.8 million each year, must be raised through lotteries, corporate donations, community events, and municipal partnerships.
The delegation pointed out that aviation and clinical services make up 76 per cent of the organization’s overall expenses, with six per cent allocated to the central Emergency Link Centre dispatch facility in Calgary and 18 per cent covering base administration and operational overhead. Delegation added that the Canada Revenue Agency allows charitable entities to spend up to 35 per cent on administration, highlighting that the organization works hard to keep administrative overhead low at around 18 per cent so the vast majority of money directly supports patient care.
Over a five-and-a-half-year period tracked between 2021 and July 31, 2026, STARS responded to 61 missions within the Town of Slave Lake and the Municipal District of Lesser Slave River. The calls were split roughly evenly between the two jurisdictions, with approximately 50 per cent taking place inside town boundaries and the other half across the wider rural municipality.
The local responses included 28 critical inter-facility transfers from the Slave Lake Healthcare Centre to major hospitals, eight scene calls inside the town, and dozens of rural scene responses near outlying communities such as Smith, Chisholm, Flatbush, Hondo, Canyon Creek, and Widewater.
Delegation said roughly 80 per cent of all flight calls involve time-sensitive conditions including cardiac arrests, serious highway collisions, strokes, and major trauma.
To handle those life-or-death situations, the delegation said the interior of each helicopter operates as an airborne intensive care unit, carrying advanced diagnostic and resuscitation tools not typically seen outside major urban hospitals.
The fleet recently added video bronchoscopes, making STARS the first air ambulance organization in the world to carry the specialized equipment on board. The tool uses a thin, flexible tube with a camera and light to detect blockages, evaluate lung conditions, and cauterize internal airway bleeding.
Flight crews also carry an i-STAT handheld blood analyzer that delivers laboratory-grade results for blood gases, electrolytes, and hemoglobin in two minutes using only two drops of blood. Other specialized tools include the compact Hamilton-T1 transport ventilator, video laryngoscopes for difficult intubations, EZ-IO drills for emergency bone-marrow fluid access, and LUCAS automatic chest compression machines for continuous CPR inside the helicopter cabin.
Delegation said the service also maintains international CAMTS safety accreditation, a voluntary standard the organization has met for 28 years. In addition, STARS transport physicians remain available around the clock to provide virtual medical support to local doctors and nurses working in rural emergency departments.
Across Alberta, 95 per cent of municipalities now partner financially with STARS, with 85 per cent qualifying as regional leaders by contributing $2 or more per capita.
“Partnership is at the core of everything that we do,” the delegation said to council. “There is no cost to the patient who may be experiencing the worst day of their entire life.”
Mayor Francesca Ward thanked the delegation for the presentation and for travelling to Slave Lake, noting council will give the funding request careful review during municipal budget meetings.
Armaan Khanna
Local Journalism Initiative Reporter