County Board of Supervisors set to approve ambulance service contract that includes AMR and County Fire next week

SANTA BARBARA COUNTY, Calif. – The County of Santa Barbara is set to approve a new Exclusive Ambulance Provider agreement during its Feb. 11 meeting that would split ambulance responses between American Medical Response (AMR) and Santa Barbara County Fire Department.

According to the County of Santa Barbara, if approved, the new four-year contract takes effect immediately with an expected two-minute reduction in response times on emergency calls countywide.

All emergency calls will go through the new Regional Fire Communications Center when the new agreement takes effect and County Fire will continue to provide ambulance services where it already serves such as Vandenberg Village, Cuyama, and UC Santa Barbara's campus detailed the County of Santa Barbara.

There is an option to expand ambulance services from Santa Barbara County Fire Department into Zone 4 in Lompoc as well as Zone 6 which includes Carpinteria, Summerland, and Montecito noted Santa Barbara County.

The contract will expand oversight by creating a 16-member Emergency Medical Care Committee and adding a clinical scorecard for patients to provide feedback.

According to Santa Barbara County, the new Emergency Medical Care Committee will provide at least annual reviews to the Board of Supervisors as an independent community advisory board whose members and nomination process were created through County Board of Supervisors Resolution No. 23-217, Section 6 which states the following:

Emergency physician – Nominated by the Hospital Association of Southern California xv Registered Emergency Department nurse – Nominated by the Hospital Association of Southern California. xvi Representative from a local City Manager’s office – Nominated by the Santa Barbara County Operational Area Emergency Services Council. xvii Public agency paramedic – Nominated by Director of the Public Health Department xviii Hospital representatives (3) – one member nominated by each hospital system: Cottage Health, Dignity Health, Lompoc Valley Health Care District. xix Fire Chiefs’ Association – Nominated by Fire Chiefs’ Association of Santa Barbara. xx Consumer Representative – Designated by the Director of the Public Health Department. xxi The Director of the Santa Barbara County Public Health department, or designee – The Director of the Santa Barbara County Public Health department, or designee. xxii The County Executive Officer, or designee – The County Executive Officer, or their designee. xxiii Supervisorial District Representative (5) – Nominated for each District by respective Supervisors.

The clinical scorecard mentioned above requires that contracted ambulance service providers to submit to a performance improvement plan if their scores fall below 90 percent for two consecutive months explained the County of Santa Barbara.

Approval of the new contract will also result in AMR dropping its current lawsuit against the County of Santa Barbara filed in September of 2023 when the County initially awarded the ambulance service contract exclusively to the Santa Barbara County Fire Department.

Your News Channel reached out to American Medical Response and its parent company, Global Medical Response, about the new agreement and did not yet receive a response.