UPDATE: Hospital Transport EMTs Face May Layoffs, Aid Cuts Blamed

COURT HOUSE — Cape Regional Medical Center informed its Ambulance Service Division’s emergency medical technicians at 9 a.m. April 27 that they would be laid off effective May 11. The department’s services will be assumed by Millville Rescue Squad, according to a union official.
Those nine full-time EMTs are represented by United Food and Commercial Workers Local 152, based in Hammonton. which covers most of the hospital’s employees, with exception of environmental workers.
Cape Regional provided the following:
“Cape Regional Health System has announced that its subsidiary, Cape Regional Ambulance Service, will be closing May 11, 2011. Cape Regional Ambulance Service has seen a significant reduction in reimbursement for ambulance transportation services as both Medicare and Medicaid reimbursement has been reduced on both the Federal and State level.
“The nine employees affected will receive severance and will be working with the Health System’s Human Re-sources department to identify employment opportunities where they can remain with the System.
“Effective May 11, the Millville Rescue Squad (MRS), which currently provides critical care transportation services for Cape Regional Medical Center patients, will begin providing basic ambulance transportation services.
“Millville Rescue Squad has been providing emergency and non-emergency transportation for over 50 years. They employ approximately 230 employees and are equipped with 50 medical response, rescue and transporta-tion vehicles.
“Each year, MRS provides service to over 50,000 patients in Atlantic, Cape May, Salem and Gloucester counties.”
Claire Galiano, vice president of the Professional Division, told the Herald, “We have a collective bargaining agreement with successor language, and would expect that Millville Rescue would absorb our membership and honor the contract.”
She said it had been rumored that the Millville Squad would be “coming into the house looking to take over the service.”
Galiano said she “asked blatantly” of the medical center’s administration if that was true.
“They said ‘no.’ The EMTs also asked administration. They said ‘no.’”
Galiano said she was asked on Monday to attend a meeting on Wednesday. At that meeting, she learned the division’s work would be outsourced to the Millville squad.
Affected union members met with their union representative at noon.
Galiano said there was “No opportunity to explore write-off alternatives to keep the service in house.”
Contact Campbell at (609) 886-8600 Ext 28 or at: al.c@cmcherald.com