Council to Discuss Paramedic Service
Paramedics would continue to provide first-response medical care on city firetrucks for the next month under an agreement expected to be approved Monday night by the City Council.
The move would extend a 90-day agreement reached as the city, county and private ambulance provider American Medical Response negotiate a long-term agreement, which is expected to reach the City Council by the end of May.
The temporary agreement will allow city firefighters trained as paramedics to continue performing life-saving measures such as CPR on patients before an AMR ambulance arrives on scene.
Under the agreement, AMR has been paying the city $10,000 monthly to cover the cost of 13 firefighter-paramedics operating on four city fire engines.
The intention is to cut response times to emergencies and focus on city firefighters because they are usually the first to arrive at an accident or emergency.
The city was forced to drop a popular, year-old city-run ambulance service last summer when the Ventura County Board of Supervisors, fearing a lawsuit, awarded the contract for ambulance service in the city to AMR.
The supervisors’ decision followed a landmark state Supreme Court ruling that counties, not cities, should decide who provides pre-hospital emergency services.
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