When we launched Where’s My Ambulance, we anticipated some pushback. After all, calling out Alberta Health Services (AHS) and their EMS management for their numerous failures doesn’t exactly earn you an invite to their holiday party. But we didn’t expect to get a cease and desist letter.
Let’s be very clear here: we don’t believe any elected official is directing a Partner and King’s Counsel at Field Law in this effort. This is the work of an AHS bureaucrat. An insulated senior manager whose name we’ll likely never know. Any FOIP request we file to uncover their identity will probably come back with more redactions than the JFK assassination.
You’ll recall that we asked you, our readers, to write your MLA and let them know what’s happening. (If you missed that post, you can catch up here.) This is still a valuable way to help. Quite frankly, it’s one of the most effective ways to voice your concerns. We’ve spent years lobbying MLAs and citizen groups to demand changes that protect paramedics and patients. Your MLA knows about these problems, but they need to hear from you that they demand immediate solutions. Whether you’ve already written to your MLA or not, thank you—and please consider doing so now. It’s more important than ever.
In response to the letter, we’ve made some changes to past posts as requested. Some posts were edited, some photos removed, and a couple of posts were nuked entirely. We don’t see any reason to enter a legal arena at this point. The letter was written with prejudice, and we take that seriously. For now, we’re choosing to play nice in the sandbox—figuratively speaking—and keeping our criticisms focused on what we unearth through FOIP requests.
Over the months we’ve been running this project, your messages to us have run the emotional gamut. Families of patients have written to praise us for holding AHS accountable. Paramedics have shared that our work represents the first glimmer of hope they’ve felt in years. Others have written heartbreaking accounts of a system so toxic that mandatory overtime, or assaults by patients isn’t even the worst abuse they’ve faced. These stories are why we believe this mission is too important to abandon. That said, to avoid further accusations of defamation or harassment. We won’t be naming individual managers or posting photos that might cause anyone to fear for their safety. We will continue to entertain requests we receive to consider and, where appropriate, alter information.
We considered folding our tent, shutting down the website, and walking away. Instead, we’ve made edits, toned down the hyperbole, and shifted our approach. But let’s be clear: we’re not stopping. If AHS lies—about Stampede, long weekend, Christmas, or New Year’s staffing—we’ll call them out with facts to back it up. We’ll continue working with town and county elected officials to ensure they know exactly what AHS isn’t telling them. Accusations of “misrepresenting FOIP data” don’t faze us. Truth is the foundation of everything we do.
From here on, we’ll stick to exposing the systemic issues through verifiable evidence. We will continue submitting FOIP requests, sharing the facts, and holding this broken system to account.
After years of asking the wrong people to change their behaviour, our focus now is on exposing the problems completely and asking elected officials to act. They must acknowledge the failures and immediately take action to course correct this mess.
If you want to support this mission, please consider contributing to our GiveSendGo: https://www.givesendgo.com/GC4M8.
We hope to continue moving forward without any further legal interference. But rest assured, we’ll keep fighting for the truth—and for the changes Alberta’s paramedics and patients deserve.
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