Mahoning Valley ambulance to cover Weatherly
Weatherly Borough Council unanimously approved Mahoning Valley Ambulance Association’s proposal to supply ambulance coverage for Weatherly Borough at a special meeting on Wednesday.
Mahoning Valley will now be the borough’s primary ambulance. Meetings of the nearby townships will take place in the next couple of weeks and they are expected to sign on as well.
The contract will provide emergency medical service coverage as required by the Weatherly Borough code. There is no initial cost to the borough. Details on conducting an ambulance membership campaign need to be worked out. Current subscribers of the Weatherly Area Ambulance Association will have their families covered into May.
Weatherly Borough Manager Harold Pudliner earned praise from members of council and Mayor P.J. Hadzick for his quick work in finding an answer to keep the borough safe. The mayor also earned praise for his role.
“Thanks to both of you,” said Councilwoman Theresa D’Andrea, who also served on the Weatherly ambulance board.
“A job well done,” Councilman Joe Thomas said.
“I’m happy with Harold’s work,” Hadzick said, noting that he thought this process could have taken as long as six months to get an agreement in place.
Mahoning Valley Ambulance has been providing temporary coverage since the Weatherly ambulance dissolved on Feb. 7.
Mahoning Valley brings an ambulance and parks it behind the Weatherly Borough municipal building, with the crew using council chambers to wait ahead of any calls. Through last year, they provided coverage in support of the Weatherly ambulance as that association began to have a shortage of manpower.
The proposal was the best of two that were submitted. It is for Mahoning Valley to build its staff toward providing 24/7 coverage for the area. Pudliner told the meeting that Mahoning Valley has six people interested in signing on as crew for the Weatherly unit, but they would not be hired until the contract was in place.
Lehighton Ambulance did not submit a proposal, but agreed instead to back up Mahoning Valley for this coverage. When the Mahoning Valley Weatherly ambulance goes out on a call, the Lehighton Ambulance team may move one of their units closer by for a quicker response if needed.
A short-term goal is to find a garage with an office to house the Mahoning Valley ambulance in Weatherly. The dissolution of the Weatherly ambulance means that until its affairs are fully wound down, the former three-bay building owned by the Weatherly ambulance is unavailable, as is any of its equipment.
