SIERRA VISTA - New hours of operation at Fort Huachuca's West Gate began Thursday, March 1.

It's a change that has been clouded by complaints that people living in the rural area west of the gate could have limited emergency medical care access, and that their trips to Sierra Vista will be hindered or become longer.

The gate is now open from 6 a.m. to 8 a.m., and 4 p.m. to 6 p.m.

Authorities indicate there will be no emergency aid hindrance caused by minimized hours of access into or through Fort Huachuca, citing an announcement on Tuesday that Cochise and Santa Cruz counties have arranged to notify the fort if a medical emergency needs to be tended to using the West Gate.

Fort Huachuca spokesman Maj. Matt Garner said a new policy of cooperation between the Santa Cruz and Cochise County sheriff's offices is under way.

"It's working very well. We've worked closely with both Cochise County and Santa Cruz County," the major said. "We want to make sure that residents who are outside the West Gate have the ability to get emergency medical attention."

The fort continues to work with leaders from both counties, Garner said.

Since the fort is a military installation, dispatchers call the military police before emergency personnel use it. In this sense, authorities say, there is no change as new West Gate hours begin.

When dispatchers get calls of emergencies in the western Huachuca Mountains, the military police ensure the West Gate is open for emergency-responder traffic, whether the gate is staffed at that time or not, a spokesperson said. This agreement continues unimpeded.

Nevertheless, residents continue to be stupefied and unconvinced to hear all these explanations, as the new gate hours have arrived.

They fear the remote nature of the area provides for potential emergency situations, and believe their concerns are being brushed aside.

Retired U.S. Army Col. Ross Romeo, who lives on the other side of the Huachucas, is the person spearheading organized dissent about the change. He said the dissent will continue.

Romeo cited a UPS truck crash in late 2006, saying emergency response took a long time because there is little or no cell phone reception in that area.

The first-responder who eventually arrived was a lone Arizona Department of Public Safety patrol cruiser through the West Gate.

West Gate area residents operate under an improvised "scoop-and-run" emergency policy, Romeo said.

Scoop and run, he explained, is when someone travels as quickly as possible to the Parker Canyon Lake general store to make a phone call.

If the store is not open, then someone must travel even more quickly toward the West Gate.

"What you do is you actually head for the West Gate and you run. Our survival is at stake here," Romeo said. "There are only two paved roads between Santa Cruz and Cochise counties, and this is one of them."

Emergencies are not uncommon, as visitors come and go to Coronado National Forest and Parker Canyon Lake. The lake is in Cochise County.

"Our survival is at stake out here, and they don't get it," Romeo said.

Romeo has contacted the American Civil Liberties Union to review the issue. Residents also met with U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, who represents the area in Congress.

Jim Pyeatt's family has lived about a half mile from the West Gate since location 1889, and he is disgruntled by the new gate hours, too.

"It's really going to affect everyone out here, anything to do with living out here," Pyeatt said.

"From my house to the Main Gate (through the fort) is about 10 miles. To go around it will be about 50 miles," he said.

It is about 65 miles to Tucson from his house, and about 45 miles to Nogales from his house, so he predicts a negative economic impact on the Sierra Vista marketplace - at least as far as his own purchasing power applies.

"We do a lot of business in Sierra Vista (for now)," he said.

Pyeatt also frets about a potential drop in emergency response time.

"I can certainly get to the gate a lot faster than an MP can from the desk," he said.

The thoroughfare now governed by the West Gate is a historic route, comprising the main road between Nogales and Tombstone in the 19th century.

Romeo said it is wrong for the federal government to restrict the thoroughfare so heavily through a wilderness area, severely affecting access of rural residents on the other side.

He called it a recipe for a public relations disaster and an extreme public safety hazard.