County Awards Medical Transport Certificates for Two Companies

BRADENTON – The number of calls for emergency and conditional medical transport is climbing at an alarming rate in Manatee County. County officials will now not only rely on private companies to do the pick-up and delivery of those in need of hospital services, but also rely on the collection of cost for the services as well.

At Tuesday's BOCC meeting, Public Safety Director Robert Smith delivered and discussed with commissioners information on the three companies that applied for the job. Ambitrans Medical Transport Inc., West Coast Southern Medical Service Inc. and ProMed Inc. all said they were up for the job, but only two were selected.

In December 2015, the Manatee County Board of County Commissioners approved Ordinance 15-37 relating to the authorization of private medical transportation services within the county and issuance of Certificate(s) of Public Convenience and Necessity (COPCN).

In the period from February 1, 2016 to March 1, 2016 the county received the three applications from entities wishing to provide the services. The applications were reviewed by staff and two were recommended.

Ambitrans Medical Transport and West Coast Southern Medical Service Inc. were recommended, ProMed wasn't chosen for reasons that later became controversial.

Smith said he didn't support ProMed because the company didn't meet the criteria the application requested, explaining that there wasn't a copy of their malpractice insurance policy in the small information packet they submitted, or other necessary information about their business.

Smith held up a small folder that was said to be ProMed's material, then held up two other sizable ones while stating, "The other two supplied all we requested."

Smith made other comments as to why ProMed wasn't quite suited for the job. He said they weren't currently servicing the area, and the other two were; but it was what he didn't say that caught the curiosity of the commission.

Kevin Holton, owner of ProMed came forward and said, "The application we submitted was twice the size of the others. It was almost a thousand pages." Holton said the information Smith was portraying about ProMed was not accurate.

Holton said, "Our company is rated in the top 165 of all of the other companies in the U.S." Holton said the other carriers need hospital equipment for some of their services: "We need nothing. We carry critical care equipment. The others don't."

Commissioners couldn't get past the disparity in the size of the submitted packets, and asked Smith why he would hold up a packet of a few pages when Holton claims there was a thousand. Smith claimed he was only holding the pages that complied with the questions the county requested.

There was a sigh of bait and switch in the room, yet Smith didn't hesitate to stick with the two companies staff recommended. Administrator Ed Hunzeker intervened stating, "The county should go with what staff recommended."

Commissioners Robin DiSabatino, Charles Smith and Carol Whitmore didn't buy it, and wanted to revisit the item at a later date. The motion was to accept staff's recommendation and it was approved, 4-3 with DiSabatino, Smith and Whitmore dissenting.