The city of Salem is suing the private ambulance company that provided service to Salem since 2015, claiming Falck Northwest owes nearly $7 million for failing to staff enough medics to respond to calls.

The city filed its lawsuit in Marion County Circuit Court on July 1. That’s the same day the Salem Fire Department took over ambulance service from Falck after a decade contracting with the company. 

The lawsuit said Falck was obligated to provide ambulance service seven days a week, 24 hours a day, but alleges that the company failed to provide that level of service without assistance from the city.

READ IT: City of Salem lawsuit against Falck

The Statesman Journal first reported the lawsuit. 

The city’s lawsuit alleges that Falck failed to meet the terms of its contract by relying on the Salem Fire Department to respond to patients in need even when call volumes were not “extraordinarily high.” It also said the company was not meeting its staffing requirements, not responding to calls quickly enough and failing to get patients to the hospital quickly. 

In the lawsuit the city alleges the company owes it $6.9 million in fines for instances when city firefighters had to respond to medical calls when a Falck ambulance was unavailable.

Between January 1, 2022, and February 15, 2025, the lawsuit claims, Falck “refused” to meet its staffing requirements under its contract for 104 weeks, with 76 of those weeks being consecutive.

That resulted in the city fire department deploying medics or mutual aid units to calls 9,259 times, the lawsuit claims.  Each instance when the fire department has to respond to a medical call is subject to a $750 fine under the city’s contract with Falck, the lawsuit claims.

The city is also seeking an unspecified amount for its actual costs for fuel, vehicle maintenance, medical supplies, and staffing overtime when responding to calls for Falck, as well as unspecified damages for negligence and attorneys fees. 

Jeff Lucia, the national communications director for Falck USA, the parent company for Falk Northwest, told Salem Reporter the company intends to fight the city’s lawsuit. 

“After 10 years, Falck completed its service in Salem in full compliance, having responded to more than 230,000 emergencies and saved countless lives. For the city to file a lawsuit one day after our partnership with the people of Salem concluded is disheartening, particularly when the claims are meritless,” Lucia said in an emailed statement. “Rather than focusing on the future of emergency services, the city is now spending public money on lawyers in what appears to be an effort to shift the costs of its own program onto Falck. We are extremely proud of our track record and the performance of our former employees, many of whom are now out of work. Their commitment to care helped define our decade of service. We will work to vigorously defend our reputation.”

City spokeswoman Erin Neff said she did not have a sense of the city’s budget for the lawsuit with Falck Northwest. 

“The city stands by its decision to sue Falck for failing to meet its contractual obligations and for costing financial damage to the city and its taxpayers,” Neff said. 

The lawsuit claims the city was financially damaged when Falck didn’t meet its obligations resulting in the city having to pay for fuel, vehicle maintenance, and medical supplies in addition to increased administrative and operational expenses, and the staffing required to meet ambulance call demand. 

The city said in the lawsuit Falck’s failures resulted in city employees working more than 54,000 extra hours “to meet the demand for ambulance transport services.”

“Falck knew or should have known that it could cause foreseeable harm to the city and the public’s interest in adequate access to ambulance transport service if it acted unreasonably in the performance of its contractual obligations,” the city’s lawsuit said. 

The suit does not mention any instance where a patient was harmed by the ambulance company’s conduct.

Former Salem Fire Chief Mike Niblock cited similar concerns about Falck’s performance when asking Salem City Council last year to approve bringing ambulance services in-house.

Falck Northwest has maintained that its staffing issues were due to pandemic related workforce shortages and difficulty attracting and retaining qualified ambulance workers. The company said after it was able to increase wages and offer sizable bonuses for new employees, it was on a positive trajectory toward stable staffing levels. 

Councilors in December 2024 gave the green light for an internal loan of over $6 million to the Salem Fire Department to help the agency pay for startup costs for the city’s new in-house ambulance service. 

The city hired and trained 52 ambulance workers, purchased 12 ambulances and medical equipment as its July 1 deadline approached.

Related coverage:

New staff sworn in as Salem Fire takes over ambulance service July 1 

Fire chief says Salem on track for city takeover of ambulance service

Councilors approve public takeover of Salem’s ambulance service

Contact reporter Joe Siess: [email protected] or 503-335-7790.

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