Compton Council Alters Ambulance Service to Hospital : Compton Cuts Ambulance Service to Nearby Hospital

The City Council has voted unanimously to stop providing ambulance service to Dominguez Medical Center in all but the most serious of medical emergencies because the hospital is engaged in a marketing effort to revise its image as a Compton-based facility.

City emergency vehicles instead will be routed to either Martin Luther King Jr. Hospital in Los Angeles or St. Francis Medical Center in Lynwood.

Reacting to what he regarded as an attack on the city’s reputation, Councilman Macxy D. Filer complained that a Dominguez official was quoted in a recent Times article as having stated that Compton had a “negative image,” although city officials were working to attract new development.

The article also disclosed that Dominguez had shifted its postal address from one side of its building to another so it would lie in Long Beach, partly to attract new patients from that portion of its service area.

In a recent letter to The Times, Dominguez Administrator Lorraine P. Auerbach complained that the article “did not accurately reflect statements made concerning our impressions, relationship and support of the Compton community.”

However, several council members said they were unhappy over the mere fact that Dominguez found it necessary to change its address.

“It hurt me so bad to see Dominguez do like that,” Councilman Floyd A. James said.

Mayor Walter R. Tucker suggested that the council delay taking any action because he had received a letter from Auerbach “apologizing” for her published remarks and contending that they had been “taken out of context.”

But James said he felt it was necessary to do something now to show that “We’re not going to stand by and take it lightly.”