Forest County commissioners chairman Mark Kingston said at the panel’s meeting Wednesday there are times when it takes an hour or more for an ambulance to arrive on the east side of the county.
“We are concerned about emergency services in the county,” Kingston said.
Commissioner Bob Snyder added, “there’s a lack of people who are qualified to do it and who are willing to do it.”
“It’s a statewide problem that is hitting close to home here,” he said.
The commissioners added that if an ambulance is on another call and no other ambulance is available, that extends the wait time.
“We’re back to the old days like it was in the 1960s…if someone falls over or gets injured you get them in a truck and drive fast,” Snyder said of the situation in Forest County, particularly on the east side of the county.
Snyder said that in the past four months there have been two incidents in which someone went into cardiac arrest in the Marienville area and it was two hours before the ambulance arrived.
In both cases, Snyder said, an adult child of the person in cardiac arrest spent two hours performing chest compressions on their parent.
“No child needs to deal with that,” he added.
Snyder said Barnett Township is the only township in Forest County that levies an EMS tax, which is split between Sigel Volunteer Fire Department and Community Ambulance Service.
The tax raises about $2,500 to $3,000 a year, Snyder said. He added that is all the state will allow them to tax.
“The only way you are going to fix this is to get every municipality and county on board and the state needs to give us the ability to do this well,” Snyder said.