Stupor Bowl 10 has been canceled because what’s going on with Augusta’s emergency ambulance service contract is not a laughing matter.
I’ll begin the latest chapter of this woeful tale that took place Friday at a special called meeting to try to break a stalemate over an emergency ambulance provider. Then I’ll lap back to Thursday’s meeting to explain how they got here.
Commissioners Sean Frantom, Alvin Mason, Brandon Garrett, Catherine Smith McKnight and Wayne Guilfoyle came to the meeting.
Commissioners Bobby Williams, Francine Scott, Tony Lewis, Jordan Johnson and Stacey Pulliam did not show up.
So, they didn’t have a quorum and couldn’t conduct any business regarding an emergency ambulance contract, zone or anything else, per General Counsel Wayne Brown.
MORE: Column: Augusta commissioners under the gun to decide about ambulance service
However, Frantom wanted it on the record that on Jan. 25, commissioners voted unanimously to pursue the EMS zone.
Then Garrett asked Brown, “What is needed to submit the application? It’s due at 4 o’clock. And how can we help it if we’re able?”
“Mr. Garrett, you do not have a quorum to conduct a meeting,” Brown said.
Then Mason said they didn’t need to vote because they’d already voted unanimously Jan. 25 to pursue the zone with the state Department of Health.
“And that action gives us the authority to utilize Gold Cross because they are our provider, and we do have a contract with them,” Mason said. “And we don’t need a vote today because we already know we can move forward.”
Guilfoyle agreed.
“Staff has already been told to pursue the zone,” he said. “You can play political games. Staff was delegated to pursue the zone on the 25th. If they decided not to, we’ll face that later, I guess.
If they didn’t, was it dereliction of duty or insubordination?
After the meeting, McKnight said, “Yesterday, Jordan Johnson was throwing his little temper tantrum, saying politics was being played. Well, politics got played today when five commissioners didn’t show up for this meeting. This is not fair to the citizens of Augusta.”
Got All That? Not in a Stupor Yet? Good.
At Thursday’s meeting, five commissioners (the same five who showed up Friday) and Mayor Garnett Johnson voted not to approve a $2.16 million annual contract with AmeriPro, the company that city staff members ranked the highest on bid documents. Then, General Counsel Wayne Brown said they could not legally vote on Commissioner Wayne Guilfoyle’s motion to award the contract to Gold Cross EMS, the second-highest scoring company, or to award Gold Cross a one-year contract.
Gold Cross is a local company that has been the Richmond County zone provider since 2013. But it’s also been the unfortunate target of some former and current city officials who have tried their best to the bankrupt them. Those officials have refused to give them a $1.9 million annual contract or to reimburse them adequately for transporting the county’s large number of indigent and non-paying patients.
And all I had to know about the selection process was that Fire Chief Antonio Burden was on the ranking committee and that AmeriPro had worked in DeKalb County where Burden was a deputy chief. That cinched it for me because of how he was hired as fire chief after not even being ranked by the company the city hired to recommend candidates for the job. That happened under the great (in his own mind) Odie Donald III’s short tenure, which I believe Donald engineered. Although he denied it, his emails showed that he did.
Anyway, the Gold Cross vendetta – and believe me it is a vendetta – started eight years ago when Sammie Sias got on the commission with the goal of having former Fire Chief Chris James run the ambulance service. Well, that was a colossal failure that cost taxpayers untold millions.
MORE: Column: Augusta’s been through some dark times, but things may be looking up
Did Anybody Do a Background Check AmeriPro?
Gold Cross relinquished the right to be Augusta’s sole ambulance provider last month by giving up the zone and agreeing to continue providing service on a month-to-month basis. And on Jan 25, Commissioner Bobby Williams’ motion for Augusta to pursue the zone passed unanimously, after which Procurement Director Geri Sams sent out requests for proposals to ambulance companies. Three responded, including Gold Cross and AmeriPro, which has only 38 operational ambulances in Georgia. And ironically enough, in light of commissioners’ refusal to adequately reimburse Gold Cross, I read an article in a Polk County newspaper about AmeriPro which was providing service there, headlined, “Ambulance Service says it has to be profitable in order to keep its word.”
Do tell.
“The Polk County Commission has been voicing its concerns steadily over the past few months as some of Polk’s AmeriPro ambulances have sat idle in admitted violation of the contract,” the article states.
Anyway, at Thursday’s called meeting, Guilfoyle said that AmeriPro had not served a jurisdiction with more than 22,000 people and that Augusta has 200,000 people. He also noted that the annual $2.16 million that Augusta would be paying AmeriPro would be going out of the area; whereas Gold Cross was local with local employees who would be replaced with new people.
Guilfoyle also objected to the fact that AmeriPro would be housing its ambulances in Augusta fire stations and the city would have to modify the 911 center.
“You ran Gold Cross out of the fire stations years ago,” Guilfoyle said. “I have not seen a company treated the way Gold Cross has been treated.”
At that point, Commissioner Jordan Johnson asked Brown what would happen if the AmeriPro contract did not pass Thursday.
“It would more than likely doom Augusta’s ability to assume the zone on the DPH level,” Brown said.
“The politics are beginning to smell,” said Johnson.
There was a call to vote on Guilfoyle’s substitute motion, but Brown said that would “put Augusta in legal harm’s way.”
Commissioner Brandon Garrett pursued Guilfoyle’s motion to award a year’s contract to Gold Cross, but Brown objected.
Guilfoyle said the intent of his motion was to save the county money, and Brown said the current month-to-month contract with Gold Cross could last for a year, but commissioners couldn’t legally commit to a year’s contract.
So, nothing was settled, and the clock was running out on meeting the DPH deadline for applying for the zone along with a provider under contract. So, the mayor called Friday’s emergency meeting.
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Will He Ever Really Be Gone?
I was going to write a Valentine’s Day poem about former Mayor Hardie Davis that began:
Roses are red. Violets are blue.
Hardie’s finally gone. I’m glad. Aren’t you?
But then I found out he’s still around, trying to get his hands back in the government till.
First, he issued an executive order in December on the mayoral transition where he:
ORDERED: Office space, furniture, furnishings, computers, office machines, and supplies at whatever place or places within the City the Mayor designates at no cost to the Mayor or his transition staff.
ORDERED: Email account access and other related services remain active until March 1, 2023 for the current Mayor as he transitions out of office on January 1, 2023.
Now, according to an email from him to Wayne Brown, Davis is claiming to be a documented full-time employee.
1. “I am a documented full-time employee. All full-time employees receive medical, dental, vision, and basic life. They also receive PTO and sick leave.
a. Why am I not receiving a payout for unused PTO and sick leave?
2. I am eligible for retirement and the documentation inquiries about whether there is any unused PTO or sick leave left to be paid in lieu of retirement.
a. I cannot answer the response to a PTO or sick leave distribution without an answer to 1 above.
These questions are prompted by my desire to continue health care coverage and retirement provides me an opportunity to do so.
Thank you,
Dr. Hardie Davis Jr.
It’s my understanding that elected officials aren’t eligible for PTO and sick leave. Former Mayor Deke Copenhaver said he never would have even thought of requesting it. Anyway, Davis took enough time off going to Dubai, England, Jerusalem, El Paso, California, Miami vacationing at taxpayers’ expense to use up any PTO if he did have it.
Former Mayor Bob Young said elected officials don’t keep time and don’t work when they don’t want to work.
“That’s the life of an elected official,” he said. “If the city buys into that, the taxpayers should be treated for PTSD.”
And as you might know, Davis rented storage space in December and paid for it with his city issued credit card, as well as for U-Haul trucks to haul it there.
MORE: Local guide to acing Valentine’s Day
Gone to the Dogs
Since voting in America has gone to the dogs with dogs and cats getting absentee ballots in the mail, these famous dogs are in their favorite hangout, Bones Bar and Grill. They’re busy watching U.S. Congress members on TV speaking about a House resolution to denounce China over its high-altitude spy balloon that traveled over the U.S. last weekend.
(“Bad Balloon Rising” is playing on the jukebox in the corner.)
I see the bad balloon a-risin’
I see trouble on the way
I see earthquakes and lightnin’
I see bad times today
Don’t go around tonight
Well it’s bound to take your life
There’s a bad balloon on the rise
I hear H-bombs a-blowin’
I know the end is comin’ soon
I fear rivers over flowin’
I hear the voice of rage and ruin
Don’t go around tonight
Well it’s bound to take your life
There’s a bad balloon on the rise, alright
Hope you got your things together
Hope you are quite prepared to die
Looks like we’re in for nasty weather
One eye is taken for an eye
Well don’t go around tonight
Well it’s bound to take your life
There’s a bad balloon on the rise
Don’t come around tonight
Well it’s bound to take your life
There’s a bad balloon on the rise
George: Wow! That song comes on right when we’re watching these Congressmen talking about a resolution to denounce China over the spy balloon that traveled from Montana to South Carolina last weekend. It’s eerie. I tell you it’s eerie that that song, “Bad Balloon Rising” should be playing now. Who chose it?
(They look blankly at each other)
Johnny. Beats me. I sure didn’t. But you know John Fogarty who wrote it said it was about the apocalypse that was going to be visited on us.
Tammy: It’s just a matter of time.
Jerry Lee: Be Bop a Lula! That’s scary. Do you think that’s what the balloon’s about?
George: Shhh! Listen!
Congressman on TV: “It traveled right over our military installations where our Minute Men and ICBMs are stored. It was obviously a spy mission. A test of the Biden administration’s will to stand up to the Communist Chinese Party and Xi Jinping. The President should have shot it down before it entered U.S. airspace.”
Jerry Lee: Be Bop a Lula! That cranky old coot couldn’t shoot the CCP and Xi Jinping the bird because Biden is a bird. A chicken! Waited until it got off the coast of South Carolina.
Johnny: You’d better watch it, calling him a chicken, Jerry Lee. He’ll be calling you a domestic terrorist and sending the FBI to arrest you and take away all the royalties you still get from your records. He’s already got you on their radar because you’re a conservative although it’s hard to believe a man who got on top of a piano barefoot and played it with his toes is a conservative.
Jerry Lee: I had to be barefoot. I couldn’t have played it with my shoes on.
George: Shhh! I want to hear this.
Congressman on TV: The entire world witnessed the brazen breach of U.S. sovereignty. Blinken was going to meet with Xi Jinping. He canceled his trip when the spy balloon became public. I don’t think he would have if it hadn’t become public. And it’s not the first time China has sent a spy balloon over the U.S. It’s happened three times.
Johnny: I guess nobody noticed it the other two times.
(Bobby Gentry and Reba McIntyre enter the bar.)
Elvis: Hello ladies. If you’re lookin’ for trouble, you’ve come to the right place. Have a seat. What have you been up to lately?
Bobby: Me. I spend a lot of time pickin’ flowers up on Choctaw Ridge
And dropping them into the muddy water off the Tallahatchie Bridge.
Elvis: Yeah, that sounds like a lot of fun. A lot more fun than what we’re doing sitting here watching these congressmen trying to pass a resolution condemning the CCP for sending their spy balloon over our country.
Reba: What an outrage! If the president or somebody doesn’t do something, the lights are not only going to go out in Georgia but all over this country.
Merle: And the world. And we won’t be drinking that free bubble up and eating that rainbow stew.
Bobby: If that ain’t true, God didn’t make little green apples.
Elvis: Right. Shhh. I guess we’d better be quiet and order some drinks. George wants to hear this guy.
George: Right. He’s Brad Sherman of California, a member of the Foreign Affairs Committee in the House.
Congressman Sherman: … And China says it reserves the right to retaliate against America for shooting down their spy balloon.
Jerry Lee: Good Golly, Miss Molly!
Congressman Sherman: China denies access to their markets, but America allows China access to our markets. And our corporations are like dogs seeking dog training treats. They roll over and play dead. Morgan Stanley advises American customers to invest 15 percent of their money in China. If anybody in the NBA mentions Hong Kong or the Uyghurs, they’re bounced out of the league. And millions of jobs we have lost. Our businesses and industries have been hollowed out the past 30 years, with a decline of wages for people without college degrees and an increase in Fentanyl.
Elvis: XI Jinping ain’t nothin’ but a hound dog!
Congressman Sherman: And China has never come clean about Covid, and we can’t get into Wuhan to examine that laboratory. … This balloon has woken us up.”
George: And we still haven’t heard a word from Biden about how those dog-eating Communists spent months silencing, oppressing and imprisoning doctors trying to suppress the virus.
Johnny: Because Xi Jinping made the Bidens multi-millionaires. He’s bought and paid for like most of those no-goods in Washington.
Jerry Lee: Good Golly Miss Molly! If China takes over the world like they’re planning to do as soon as they build up their nuclear arsenal, we won’t be dogs anymore. We’ll be hot dogs! Great balls of fire! Or toast!
South Carolina Rep. Russell Fry: I never would have imagined my Saturday afternoon would have been disrupted by a Chinese spy balloon. Not only did it float across South Carolina. It floated across the entire continental United States. And of all places it was shot down right off the coast of my hometown, Surfside Beach, which I represent. It’s comical to me that they would think we would believe it was a weather balloon. This was a test by the Communist Chinese Party, and the administration failed it.
June: My grandma lived in Myrtle Beach, for cryin’ out loud. Oh listen, Johnny, they’re playing our song.
I fell into a burnin’ ring of fire
I went down, down, down
And the flames went higher
And it burns, burns, burns
The ring of fire, the ring of fire
I fell into a burnin’ ring of fire
I went down, down, down
And the flames went higher
And it burns, burns, burns
The ring of fire, the ring of fire
Sylvia Cooper is a columnist with The Augusta Press. Reach her at sylvia.cooper@theaugustapress.com
