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EMS District 2 approves piggyback on Vancouver ambulance contract, authorizes interlocal agreement
Summary
The EMS District 2 board on April 14 approved starting talks to piggyback on the City of Vancouver's ambulance service contract and authorized the chair to sign a related interlocal agreement once terms are negotiated.
The EMS District 2 board on April 14 approved starting communications with the City of Vancouver to piggyback on Vancouver's ambulance service contract and authorized the board chair to sign an interlocal cooperative purchasing agreement once it is negotiated.
Staff said the piggyback would avoid a separate, time-consuming request-for-proposal process and allow the district to meet a target start date of Jan. 1, 2026. Deanne Cortes, Clark County contract administrator, told the board that Vancouver's RFP and contract include cooperative-purchasing language, and that Vancouver's March 6, 2024 RFP received only two proposals.
"With this request, staff is asking for the board's approval to piggyback off of the City of Vancouver's ambulance service contract," Cortes said. She told the board that a separate RFP would be "expensive" and "extremely time consuming," and that a piggyback was the work group's preferred option.
Board members raised questions about "readiness fees" in the Vancouver contract and whether EMS District 2 would inherit those costs. Cortes said those fees are negotiable: "Everything is negotiable, and EMS District 2 is definitely going to try to reduce to negotiate that readiness fee down as low as possible, if not to 0. As far as the City of Vancouver, I can't speak to that. That's gonna be between them and the contractor, but EMS District 2 is definitely going to explore options to get that to 0 as much as possible."
The board then voted to allow staff to begin discussions with Vancouver and later voted to authorize Chair Sue Marshall to sign an interlocal cooperative purchasing agreement with Vancouver once the two parties have negotiated terms. Cortes told the board that, under state law, agencies must have an interlocal agreement to undertake cooperative purchasing: "Per RCW 39.34.030, agencies need to have interlocal cooperative agreements in place to be able to do the cooperative purchasing." Cortes added that Vancouver may need to take any interlocal to its city council for approval.
Board members said they could request to see the interlocal draft at the May meeting if they preferred to approve it in public rather than authorize the chair to sign it immediately. Staff said it will circulate proposed agreement language to the board before the May meeting and that the chair's signature authority was requested only to speed the timeline.
Next steps: staff will begin negotiations with the City of Vancouver and return a proposed interlocal agreement and any related documents to the board in May. The arrangement remains contingent on the City of Vancouver's agreement and any required approvals on that side.
Votes at a glance: - Motion to approve starting communications to piggyback on the City of Vancouver ambulance service contract — moved by Dan (board member); second not specified in the record; passed by voice vote (ayes). - Motion to approve that Chair Sue Marshall may sign an interlocal cooperative purchasing agreement with the City of Vancouver once negotiated — mover and second not specified in the record; passed by voice vote (ayes).
