By Douglass Dowty
syracuse.com
SYRACUSE, N.Y. — AMR has promised to report monthly response times and staffing data as part of Syracuse’s first-ever ambulance contract approved Tuesday by the Common Council.
For the first time, Syracuse city officials will receive monthly performance metrics from AMR, a private ambulance corps that, with its corporate predecessors, has covered the city for decades.
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City taxpayers won’t pay AMR to be their primary ambulance service. But the agreement, and the ability to look more closely at AMR’s operations, should help the fire department use its own ambulance only when necessary, fire officials said.
AMR has 300 staff and 32 ambulances responding to roughly 140 daily calls in Syracuse.
AMR’s new standards include:
- Respond to 90% of its city calls within 9 minutes.
- Respond to at least 97% of calls within the city — the remaining 3% can still go to suburban ambulance corps under an agreement called mutual aid.
- Share daily staffing data with city officials
AMR also agreed to start an ambulance complaint hotline for residents to call in concerns. It promised to offer scholarships for EMS training to city residents and to replace aging equipment.
The contract isn’t expected to force AMR — the country’s largest ambulance provider — to make immediate changes: Both sides said that the ambulance corps has largely adhered to standard so far this year, following pandemic shortages that saw significantly worse performance metrics.
Fire officials described it as more a formalization of discussions both sides have been having for months.
It’s an unusual contract. No money is exchanging hands, unlike with most ambulance contracts across the country.
On the other hand, AMR faces no consequences for failing to meet its standards, other than a requirement that it discuss problems with city fire officials.
That’s what led Common Councilor Chol Majok to cast the lone vote against the proposal.
“There is no teeth in this contract,” Majok told syracuse.com after the vote. “You cannot have a contract without an enforcement mechanism.”
Fire officials, including Chief Michael Monds, stressed to the council that AMR’s performance has been up to par in the past year.
The city fire department, which has its own ambulance, has only had to supplement AMR’s rigs once in the past six to seven months, fire officials said. That’s far better than four years ago, when the fire department launched its ambulance service and AMR failed to reach 10% of its calls.
This year, AMR is responding to between 98% and 99% of the city’s projected 50,000 calls.
The three-year contract with AMR passed the council with a vote of 8-1. There is a provision to extend the contract another two years if both sides agree.
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