The Ambulance Contract War Flares Up

by Andy Caldwell

The root of many problems in America today has to do with the fact that certain truths are lost on the public because they were first lost intentionally or otherwise, by the press. That is, if the press is too lazy, or worse, too politically sympathetic (notice the “we” with emphasis added in the report below) to report both sides of a story, well then, the public will never be the wiser.

Consider this excerpt from KSBY’s Juliet Lemar: “Last year, county supervisors approved a multi-provider ambulance transport system, created by county fire, and 35 ambulances were purchased…but due to legal action by American Medical Response in March of 2024, everything has been put on pause according to County Fire Chief Mark Hartwig (no mention of the fact that AMR was illicitly aced out of the “multi-provider” contract by county fire, hook and crook).

"So,” asks Juliet Lemar, KSBY news reporter, “even if we wanted to use the ambulances that we've already purchased, those can't be in use because of the lawsuit?"

Hartwig: "That's right. Yeah."

Lemar: "You have these ambulances in storage that could increase response times. How does that make you feel as someone who's on the front lines?"

Tell us how you feel?

Unfortunately, this was the general quality of reporting when the County Fire Chief’s Association issued a press release asking county supervisors to employ county fire ambulances to allegedly address ambulance response times in our community. No context. No history. No fact checking.

A Spin for the Win

As I have reported previously, the County Fire Chiefs’ Association needs to start telling the truth rather than continuing to try to spin for the win. That is, when AMR won the contract to be the sole ambulance provider in the county, the Fire Chiefs’ Association lobbied the board of supervisors to cancel the contract and to ostensibly require AMR to share the contract with the county fire department. The association stated that “a two-permit-based model is financially viable, and reasonably equitable, for both permit holders, and it will improve services while requiring no county subsidy.”  It has now been reasonably assumed by the court, via an injunction, that the county was most likely only pretending to create a process to share the ambulance services contract with AMR, as the supervisors’ real intention was to give county fire the sole service contract. Hence, the hubris of the county to purchase 35 ambulances surreptitiously in the middle of the contract competition. 

When AMR sued the county over this dirty deal, however, the Fire Chiefs’ Association then reverse-argued in court that, “If the County is forced into a multiple-provider situation, the harm to the public will be severe. It will be inequitable, unsafe, and unsustainable. Permit applications from both County Fire and AMR articulate concern regarding insufficient revenue to support more than one provider per permit type.” Thankfully, the double speak was not lost on the judge. Yet, now, with this latest press release, the County Fire Association has changed its story once again.

35 County Fire Ambulances Rotting Away

What is really going on here? Those ambulances, which were bought secretly, are now experiencing lot-rot in a storage facility that costs $15,000 per month. Meanwhile, the county also spent millions to build a redundant emergency dispatch center (there was nothing wrong with the center they previously shared with the county sheriff) that is also burning a hole in their collective pockets. I suspect they need those elusive ambulance revenues to help pay for the facility. In conclusion, these fire chiefs are good at putting out fires, unless it’s their own pants that are on fire. But they are not very good at stealing ambulance contracts no matter how many times they change their story or how many excuses they manage to come up with.

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