Sweeping changes are coming to the city of San Diego's agreement with the ambulance services company, Falck.
The city is planning to take over the company's billing and staffing responsibilities.
The changes will bring the city’s ambulance service to an alliance model seen in many cities across the U.S.
San Diego Fire-Rescue Department Fire Chief Colin Stowell and Deputy Fire Chief David Gerboth are working to make those changes a reality.
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“We are working on becoming a recognized EMS provider that would give the City Fire Department the ability to collect ground emergency transportation reimbursements. These reimbursements would be reinvested to improve EMS service and we would subcontract with multiple EMS providers to make sure we provide the necessary EMS hours for the community,” Gerboth said.
Falck became the ambulance provider for the City of San Diego in November 2021 and has fallen short of some of their contractual obligations.
“The Contract requires Falck to provide a monthly median of 900 Advanced Life Support Hours and 108 basic life support hours per day. Since the time of the contract implementation, as you’ve heard many times, Falck has been unable to achieve the required hours within the contract,” Gerboth said.
Representatives at Falck believe the signing bonus they recently implemented is helping them get closer to reaching their goals.
“When we announced our $50,000 sign-on bonus in late November, we got a tremendous response to that. In-fact we have doubled the number of paramedics that we have hired on a monthly basis. We currently have hired 31 paramedics since then and they are in some sort of new hire training or riding in the field with a training officer or about ready to get out in the field,” Falck Managing Director Jeff Behm said.
SDFD plans on bringing the amendments SDFD and Falck agreed upon to the Public Safety Committee in March.
If the changes are approved, it will go to a full city council for their approval.
