The Jasper County Board of Supervisors Monday morning opened county ambulance service bids for the second time in the past several months, after coming to a unanimous agreement on a lone service provider bid proposal in mid-October and later in mid-November rescinding that decision in a 3-to-2 vote, following a review of the company’s finalized contract. The county has now received a significantly lesser bid from the same company, along with two other bids.
CareMed out of Newton County was the only ambulance service provider to submit a bid to the county in October when bids were originally received. The company bid $125,000 annually at that time, which would have reflected an estimated $33,000 to $35,000 savings per year to the county for an ambulance service, as opposed to the county’s current provider, ASAP.
CareMed also promised the county two brand new, box-truck type ambulances ordered straight from the assembly line and a backup ambulance. However, after Board Attorney Ricky Ruffin reviewed the final contract provided by CareMed and presented findings to the board, three board members had issues with the contract, especially revolving around dispatching. That led to the 3-to-2 decision to rescind the original unanimous approval by the board and to a 3-to-2 decision to re-advertise for an ambulance service for the county. Supervisor Eddie Helms of Beat 1, Supervisor Doug Rogers of Beat 3, and Supervisor Randy Corley of Beat 4 all voted to rescind the original motion that took place on the service in October, and each agreed to re-advertise for bids. Supervisor Curtis Gray, Sr. of Beat 5 and Supervisor Sandy Stephens of Beat 2 opposed the decision on both motions.
“I got the (CareMed) contract, and there were some things in it that I was not really happy about because it had not been mentioned in the proposal,” Ruffin mentioned to the Supervisors in November. “After talking to them (CareMed), we talked about adding a CPI (consumer price index) for medical services to the contract for each year. I checked that, and for the last few years that has been nominal, less than 2 percent. They had a 3 percent, and I told them we were not going to agree to that. Now, we have that part covered. They also did not have a ‘dispatch’ in the area, and the Sheriff and I talked about that. Because he has only one person on ‘911’ dispatch, he did not think he could do that without adding extra personnel.”
The current ambulance provider in the county, ASAP, has a dispatch service that runs directly in conjunction with Jasper County emergency dispatch. Board President Curtis Gray, Sr. contacted CareMed COO Stan Alford via phone during the November meeting, and Alford offered dispatch through Newton County. With that, according to Ruffin, Jasper County 911 calls would go through the Jasper County Sheriff’s Department, to Newton County, then to CareMed ambulance service.
“Newton County’s 911 staffing is going to be responsible for dispatching to Jasper County,” asked Beat 3 Supervisor Doug Rogers during the November meeting. “I want to make sure that if we have a storm on the north part of this county and Newton County is getting the influx of calls that we are going to be able to handle dispatching.”
Later during that November meeting while Gray was pushing for the CareMed contract approval, Rogers simply said, “I have a problem with it,” and motioned for the rescinding of the original vote from October.
A representative from ASAP ambulance service during the mid-November meeting of the supervisors explained to the board that the company had essentially just forgotten about the bid procedure and contract renewal process with the county that took place in October. ASAP’s contract with the county was to expire on November 30, 2020 at midnight, but the ambulance company has remained the county’s provider since the rescinded motion revolving around CareMed, and has had a representative on hand at each board meeting since the mid-November meeting.
Three ambulance service providers - CareMed, ASAP, and Patient Care - presented bid proposals to the Jasper County Board of Supervisors Monday morning. CareMed bid $105,000 annually, ASAP presented a $143,500 bid, and Patient Care bid $164,000 with an elevated scale per year.
The board, with minimal discussion on the topic Monday morning, voted unanimously to take the bid proposals under advisement.