By Chris Metinko
The Oakland Tribune
OAKLAND — Alameda County supervisors moved a significant step closer to bringing a new ambulance service to the county, despite pleas from local paramedics and emergency medical technicians against any service change.
The county’s board of supervisors unanimously voted to approve entering into contract negotiations with Texas-based Paramedics Plus, even though more than a hundred American Medical Response workers flooded the supervisors’ chambers. The workers urged supervisors not to end the long-term relationship with their company, which has been operating in Alameda County in some incarnation for nearly 40 years.
Many paramedics and emergency medical technicians said they feared not only for their jobs, but also the care county residents would receive under a new provider.
“Please don’t make decisions that are going to put in jeopardy the clinical care of Alameda County residents,” said Lee Siegel, a paramedic for 19 years in the county.
Many also brought up the issue of transparency in the bidding process for the new five-year ambulance contract. County officials refused to release the proposals they received for the contract, meaning not even the supervisors were able to see the proposals. Instead, they had to rely on a three-page staff report and the recommendation of a five-member selection committee assembled by the county.
“You are being asked to vote on something you have not seen in its entirety,” said Julie Silva, who’s been with American Medical in the county for 20 years. “It’s the equivalent of treating a patient without assessing the problem with the patient first.”
Last month, the county’s health care services agency released the selection committee’s final scoring, indicating that Paramedics Plus had submitted a lower bid than American Medical on a contract. American Medical officials have protested the recommendation of Paramedics Plus, contending that Paramedics Plus had underbid and filed a Public Records Act request to review documents associated with the bidding, including the Texas company’s proposal and the committee’s scoring sheets. County officials denied the request, citing a 2006 state Supreme Court ruling that gave agencies the right to withhold bidding information if the disclosure could hinder contract negotiations with the winning bidder.
County Counsel Richard Winnie said not releasing such documents before a contract is finished is normal county policy and the bidding information will eventually be made public, but not until negotiations are complete and the contract is sent to the supervisors for final approval, likely sometime in May or June.
While exact details of Paramedics Plus’ bid will not be released until then, the company’s president, Tony Myers, promised supervisors they will hire nearly all of American Medical Response’s personnel who work under its emergency services arm, which is more than 300 employees.
Supervisor Scott Haggerty grilled Myers to get a promise that American Medical employees would be kept.
“I’m getting a bunch of letters saying I’m bringing in a bunch of Texans and laying off” county residents, Haggerty told Myers.
Myers said that was not the case and that while his company is based in Texas, he promised Paramedics Plus will hire locally.
Copyright 2010 Contra Costa Newspapers