Berlin mulls own ambulance service
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By David Delcore TIMES ARGUS STAFF - Published: November 17, 2009
BERLIN – Despite one member's misgivings, the town's selectboard appears poised to solicit proposals for ambulance services during the coming fiscal year.
Midway through a one-year contract extension it signed with Barre Town Emergency Medical Services, following a bid process that unraveled earlier this year, the selectboard has all but decided it's time to test the market again.
The difference is this time they fully expect their own volunteer fire department to join Barre, Barre Town and Montpelier in making a play for Berlin's business.
In fact, the push to solicit proposals at this early stage is largely being driven by the fact that if members of the Berlin Volunteer Fire Department are going to get into the ambulance business they need ample time to acquire equipment, obtain the necessary training and certifications and sell the idea to local voters.
However, board member Susan Gretkowski worried that it would be difficult, if not impossible, to fairly compare a proposal submitted on behalf of an ambulance service that doesn't exist with three that already do.
"I'm not comfortable with that at all," she said. "I think it's very different to get a (proposal) from an outside EMS service that's going to give us a flat rate that I think we can count on versus all of the complexities of us developing in town here a service where if the number are off, if the numbers are wrong, if something happens it's going to come back into our lap."
Given ongoing conversations involving the possibility of creating a regional ambulance service, Gretkowski said she was worried by the relative lack of any public discussion of a local option.
"To me I think this is a huge policy decision," she said. "I don't see how we could cut the public out of this."
However, others on the board suggested those public hearings could still occur after competing proposals were in hand – providing the board and the community with the information needed to evaluate them.
Chairman Brad Towne said merely accepting proposals didn't bind the board to any particular course of action, but would allow the process to play out without disadvantaging any of the participants.
"If you're not comfortable with the fire department's proposal – if you don't think you can deliver the goods – so to say then of course you go with someone else," he said.
Gretkowski said timing was a big part of the problem.
"I know they (the fire department) need a decision by January in order for them to get this off the ground for July, but it would be almost nice if we could back up a little bit and try to have some detail," she said, freely conceding that a public discussion of the financial assumptions underlying the department's proposal would allow give other ambulance services an unfair advantage in the bidding process.
In the end, Gretkowski grudgingly agreed that the board should solicit proposals, but suggested it require extremely specific responses that would enable it to make a qualitative evaluation of the services.
Board members instructed Town Administrator Jeff Schulz to modify a request for proposals that they are expected to adopt next week. A tentative response deadline of Dec. 18 has been set. Presumably Barre, Barre Town and Montpelier will fine-tune the proposals they submitted nearly a year ago.
The volunteer fire department has been working on its proposal in hopes of launching an ambulance service for the town on July 1.
Gretkowski said there are many questions involving that service, not the least of which involves the possibility town taxpayers may have to come up with start-up money.
In other business Monday, board members approved Pike Industries' request to transport nearly 150,000 cubic yards of fill from E.F. Knapp Airport over a the town-owned section of Airport Road.
Assuming the state is able to obtain an amendment to the Act 250 land-use permit issued for the $6.2 million airport project, the trucks would begin rolling early next year.
Concern that the high-volume of heavy trucks would damage the road was alleviated by Pike's offer to repave it. The board was presented with four alternatives for reclaiming the road, but opted to postpone a decision at this time until after it had a better sense of how much damage is actually done.
david.delcore@timesargus.com
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