By Leanne M. Robicheau
Bangor Daily News (Maine)
Copyright 2006 Bangor Daily News
WARREN, Maine — A judge has ruled that the town may stop providing emergency ambulance services to two state prisons.
The Superior Court decision remains subject to appeal.
In a July 13 order filed at Kennebec County Superior Court in Augusta, Justice Donald H. Marden ruled that the Maine Emergency Medical Services Board must issue a waiver to the town of Warren allowing the town to cease emergency ambulance services to Maine State Prison and Bolduc Correctional Facility, both located off Route 97.
“We won’t just drop emergency services,” Town Manager Grant Watmough said Monday.
The town must wait for a written waiver from the board before it can cancel emergency responses to the prisons, Watmough said, noting the state will also need time to find alternative services. He did not know how soon a waiver would be issued or if the board would appeal the decision.
A telephone call to Maine EMS Director Jay Bradshaw was not immediately returned.
On Monday, Augusta attorney Roger Katz, who represents Warren, said the judge’s decision must be appealed to the Maine Supreme Judicial Court within 21 days, but that the starting date was unclear. He did not know how long the Maine EMS Board has to issue a waiver.
Aside from the prison population, Warren has roughly 4,000 residents who are served by Warren Rescue, a one-ambulance department staffed by volunteer personnel. Maine State Prison has approximately 900 inmates, and the Bolduc unit has about 200 prisoners.
In May 2005, Warren appealed a decision by Maine Emergency Medical Services requiring the town to provide emergency ambulance service to the prisons. The Maine EMS Board denied a waiver of its rules.
Before the Thomaston state prison closed in 2002, Warren provided only three to six ambulance calls per year to the Bolduc facility and a 100-bed Supermax prison here.
Since 2002, when a new Maine State Prison opened here, ambulance calls to the prisons have climbed to 39 to 49 calls annually.
In 2004, changes in state law reduced the reimbursement for prison ambulance calls from $330 per call to the MaineCare rate of $90 per call.
Those financial ramifications, coupled with other concerns, prompted the town to seek a waiver from Maine Emergency Medical Services’ rules requiring emergency ambulance response to the public. The town fears increased calls to the prison jeopardizes services to nonincarcerated residents and puts ambulance staff at risk from contact with sometimes dangerous prisoners.
Justice Marden ruled in favor of the EMS board in respect to inmates being members of the public, but sided with Warren on the matter of the prison calls burdening such a small ambulance department.
“The record is unequivocal that [Warren] is significantly injured or harmed if the rule is not waived and there is no evidence to support the contrary conclusion,” the judge wrote. “Since it appears undisputed that the Warren Ambulance Service is a one-vehicle volunteer operation and is an organization charged with the responsibility of supporting a public of approximately 4,000 persons, increasing the public population by almost 25 percent unquestionably poses a health and safety risk to the non-prison population of the town.
“Because the evidence is overwhelmingly contrary to the [emergency medical services board’s] decision on the question of waiver, this court finds it to be an abuse of discretion,” he wrote.
The order sends the matter to the Maine EMS Board for issuance of a waiver of rules to the town.