Schaefer's Ambulance Service v. County of San Bernardino

The Emergency Medical Services System and the Prehospital Emergency Medical Care Personnel Act (the EMS Act, or the Act) (Health & Saf. Code, § 1797 et seq.) allows a county to create exclusive operating areas for emergency ambulance services. In 1985, the County of San Bernardino (County) created 15 exclusive operating areas and assigned 2 of them to both Schaefer’s Ambulance Service (Schaefer) and a second ambulance company. At the time, Schaefer was providing ambulance services at the basic life support level; the other company was providing ambulance services at the advanced life support level.

Schaefer filed this action for injunctive and declaratory relief, in which it asserts a right to begin providing advanced life support in these* two exclusive operating areas without the County’s permission. It also asserts a right to carry patients from one medical facility to another, both inside and outside its exclusive operating areas, without the County’s permission. The trial court ruled Schaefer had no such rights. We will affirm.

I

The Statutory Scheme

“ ‘[T]he EMS Act . . . create[s] a comprehensive system governing virtually every aspect of prehospital emergency…