The Weekly Newspaper of Torrance Herald Publications - Torrance, El Segundo, Manhattan Beach, Hawthorne, Lawndale, & Inglewood Community Newspapers Since 1911 - (310) 322-1830 - Vol. 5, No. 31 - July 30, 2015 Inside This Issue Certified & Licensed Professionals.......................7 Classifieds............................4 Crossword/Sudoku.............4 Legal Aid for Elders...........8 Food.......................................5 Legals....................................6 Real Estate...........................8 Sports....................................3 TerriAnn in Torrance..........7 Weekend Forecast Worshipping on a Sunny Morning Churchgoers take morning worship to the beach. Photo by Peter Thornton, jp.thornton58@gmail.com Friday AM Clouds/ PM Sun 79˚/67˚ Saturday Partly Cloudy 78˚/67˚ Sunday AM Clouds/ PM Sun 79˚/68˚ City Council Extends Agreement with McCormick Ambulance By Cristian Vasquez After much discussion, the Torrance City Council approved a first amendment to contract services agreement with Westmed Ambulance Inc., d.b.a. McCormick Ambulance for emergency Singing for His Supper and (Hopefully) One Million Dollars By Nancy Peters The claim to fame for Arnold Livingston Geis, and his pals Kevin Blickfeldt and David Castillo, along with new singing group partner DeMar Neal, may be coming in the form of a 10-year-old competition TV series, America’s Got Talent (AGT). Back in February, Kevin contacted Dave and Arnold and suggested they send in an audition tape to AGT for this milestone season. Thus, began a journey that could potentially put the new singing group on the “map” in Las Vegas, with a headlining show and a $1,000,000 prize. The young men put together a required audition tape for evaluation by producers. The tape was viewed sometime in February. In March, after hearing that they were moving on to the in-person producer’s audition, they showed up at the designated location. That resulted in a scheduled filming to be on the TV show, which took place at the Dolby Theater in Hollywood on April 11. There they were judged by the celebrity judges (Howard Stern, Howie Mandel, Mel B, and Heidi Klum). The new season of AGT began in May 2015 and although the group of four young men were a blip during the first introductory clips of future talent, it was not until Tuesday evening, July 7 that VOX was introduced during the last 25 minutes of the two-hour show. VOX was informed on that Monday to inform their family and See Singing, page 4 ambulance transportation services, as well as patient billing services. The council exercised the city’s option to extend the agreement under the same terms and conditions as before but for an additional one-year term [Dec. 2, 2016]. The original agreement for ambulance services was approved by the city council on Nov. 18, 2014 and was “to provide emergency ambulance transportation and patient billing services for the Torrance Fire Department to Westmed Ambulance Inc.,” according to the staff report. “The agreement was issued as a result of an RFP [Request for Proposal] process and has a one-year term [from Dec. 3, 2104-Dec. 2, 2015], with an option for the City to extend the agreement for up to four additional 1-year terms with the same terms and conditions,” states the staff report signed by Torrance Fire Chief William Racowschi. “According to the contract term provision, the City’s option to extend the Agreement mist be exercised by an amendment to the Agreement and approved by the City Council as well as by serving a written notice on Contractor of City’s intention to extend no sooner than 180 days or less than 90 days prior to the expiration of the Agreement.” Speaking on behalf of the fire department was Torrance Fire Department EMS Coordinator and Captain Brian Hudson who stated that the department closely monitors McCormick Ambulance’s performance based on the standards set by the contract. In that monitoring effort, it was revealed that two of the contract’s requirements had not been met: the implementation of a Computer Aided Dispatch [CAD] to CAD interface and response time compliance. “A Contract Compliance Report was issued to McCormick Ambulance in June 2015, which addressed all requirements of the contract,” Captain Hudson said. “According to McCormick Ambulance, they initiated communications with Spillman and Zoll regarding CAD to CAD interface in October 2014 and continue to work on the interface as well as on ensuring the response time compliance.” The lack of CAD-to-CAD compliance, as well as proper response time tracking, is not an exclusive lack of attention on behalf of McCormick Ambulance. “One of the challenges that we have to overcome is just the lack of work that had not been done in the previous three years to the CAD-to- CAD interface,” Fire Chief Racowschi said. “We were quite frankly surprised that almost near nothing had been done to develop the interface other than to conceptually [develop]. Once we got to the current vendor, they pressured Zoll and when they got our project, it was put into cue and now they have put pressure on them.” Response time, which contract standards require arrival in less than 8 minutes, were met 92 percent of the time. The staff report showed a 92 percent compliance rate during December, 2014; 88 percent during January, 93 percent in February, 92 percent in March and 88 percent in April. The months of May and June are still under review. “When we went on the original RFP, the staff at that time was directed by, I believe Chief Adams, to do a query of what other agencies that used transportation services set as their requirements,” Chief Racowschi said. “We started with the L.A. County requirements and we did a survey of like cities that use third party vendors and I believe that is how we set up our standard here.” According to the staff report, the transition to McCormick Ambulance has been considered successful during its first seven months “with zero interruptions or decrease in services pro- See City, page 6
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