Citizens groups are complaining that the public is being left off a task force that will determine the future of the District of Columbia’s emergency response system.
The task force was created as part of a remarkable settlement with the family of slain journalist David Rosenbaum. The family agreed to drop its $20 million lawsuit against the city, and in return, the District agreed to fix its emergency services that botched Rosenbaum’s care.
The task force will include representatives of the city government, Rosenbaum’s family and medical experts. Fenty expects to finalize the panel in the next two weeks.
Federation of Citizens Associations President George Clark said the public should be involved in decisions concerning the future of the city’s emergency services. Rosenbaum’s death was one of several bungled response calls the city made last year, Clark said.
“It is the citizens who will have to deal with the recommendations of the task force,” Clark said.
Clark said he was concerned that the task force meetings would be closed to the public. He also worried that the mayor would pack the panel with emergency officials who had an interest in keeping the status quo.
The fire department “should not be the witness, judge and jury — maybe witness, but not judge and jury,” Clark said.
The composition of the task force was part of the settlement, Fenty spokeswoman Mafara Hobson said.
The public will have a chance to testify before the task force but will not be represented, Hobson said.
Clark said nothing in the agreement would prevent the appointment of citizens.
Rosenbaum attorney Pat Regan could not be reached Wednesday.
Rosenbaum, 63, was beaten with a heavy plastic pipe near his Northwest Washington home in January 2006, but rescue workers thought he was drunk and did not take him to the nearest hospital. They left Rosenbaum on a hospital gurney for nearly two hours before doctors examined him. He died two days later.
A D.C. inspector general’s report last summer found numerous problems with the response and found a “culture of indifference” within the city’s emergency response system.
