City Council votes to have own ambulance service

In a bid to plug a multimillion dollar budget shortfall, Torrance will soon end its current contract with McCormick Ambulance and bring the lucrative service in-house despite the Fire Department providing documentation that the move will reduce the level of ambulance service to the community.

The City Council approved the move on a 6-1 vote Tuesday with Councilman Mike Griffiths casting the dissenting vote.

“This whole thing was rammed down our throats so fast,” Griffiths said Wednesday. “The public has no idea the council just reduced ambulance service to the city.”

Fire Chief Martin Serna had characterized the department’s proposal as just the opposite.

The proposal, he said, was both a “response to a

budget challenge” and the opportunity to “provide a higher level of service.”

The Fire Department, like all others in the city, must cut its budget by 5%, or about $2.4 million. In contrast, bringing the transportation of patients to local hospitals in-house would give the city an extra $2 million annually in revenues it could use for its operating budget, officials said.

Failure to take over providing ambulance service would result in the layoffs of as many 10 firefighters — a reduction of four on a daily basis, Serna said. Mayor Pat Furey pointed out that would mean a fire truck would be taken out of service completely.

But relatively infrequent fire calls comprise just 20% of responses from the department, with medical emergencies representing the other 80%, a figure not expected to decrease given the city’s aging population.

Paying for the service, under the proposal, relies on $400,000 in funding from two new fees related to transporting patients that have yet to be approved by the council.

Bringing ambulances in house could also reduce how frequently the emergency vehicles are available.

McCormick’s current contract with the city requires the company to provide five ambulances 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Under the council-approved proposal, though, Torrance will staff two ambulances around the clock, with the other three manned only during peak hours.

City officials, however, said they intended to retain a “surge agreement” with McCormick in the event of an incident that caused mass casualties, but they didn’t say how much that would cost. The department’s analysis also said the community would see reduced emergency response times with the layoffs as well.

But Griffiths used the city’s own computer modeling to demonstrate that would amount to mere seconds — a “negligible” amount, he said.

“To quote you chief, ‘The implementation of this program would in fact be a fundamental shift for our whole community’ and right off the bat, that’s where I’m concerned,” Griffiths said during the meeting. “There’s too many unknowns and concerning factors for me to be comfortable going ahead with this proposal at this time.”

Griffiths’ fellow panelists did not share his concerns.

“I’m also concerned about the expansion of government,” Councilman Aurelio Mattucci said, “but I do understand the benefits of this.”