National City councilmembers plan to authorize a loan that would fund startup costs for in-house ambulance services.
The $6.5 million loan would come from the city’s sewer fund and be given to the Fire Department, which would be handling the launch. According to a staff report, the loan would be repaid over a 10-year period, following one year of operating the service in-house and collecting revenue from it.
For decades, the city has contracted its ambulance services with American Medical Response. The contract was set to expire by the end of August, but the city and AMR had been in negotiations to extend the contract during the city’s transition into in-house services.
AMR told inewsource in previous reporting that it was committed to “no disruption in emergency services for the community.”