By Tanya Drobness
The Star-Ledger
MORRISTOWN, N.J. — Emergency Medical Service squads responded last night to what they said was a critical problem. But it wasn’t a cardiac arrest or car accident.
Calling Gov. Jon Corzine’s proposal to redirect millions of dollars from the EMT Training Fund a “raid,” more than 60 volunteer ambulance squads and nearly 300 people from throughout the state held a protest last night on the Morristown Green.
“It’s about one voice and one message to the governor: Leave our training fund alone,” said rally organizer Dominick Sandelli, captain of the volunteer Morristown Ambulance Squad.
The proposed budget calls for the reallocation of $4 million from the fund to the general treasury, one of Corzine’s measures to make up for a sharp drop in state revenues.
“It was a difficult decision. But we have to meet our constitutional obligation to balance the budget,” said Tom Bell, a state Treasury Department spokesman.
“We found that there was a surplus of funds, and they can absorb the reduction without any programmatic impact,” Bell said.
Sandelli said the fund has $4.4 million; Corzine’s plan would leave it with $400,000.
Event organizers said it takes $3.5 million annually to train volunteer emergency medical technicians statewide. “As volunteers, this fund is the only source for training. If this goes away, it will cost a lot of money for new EMTs, and our volunteer membership is going to drop drastically,” said Sue Van Orden, president of the New Jersey State First Aid Council.
Volunteers would have to pay for their own training, Sandelli said, and the average cost of a 120-hour EMT course has quadrupled over the decade to about $800.
The EMT Training Fund was established in 1992, according to Sandelli. The fund is endowed by a 50-cent surcharge on tickets for moving violations issued in New Jersey.
“It was dedicated to us, and dedicated funds should be left for the purposes they were intended for,” Sandelli said.
State legislators who attended the rally said less training would put lives at risk. “Who is more vulnerable than a person in need of emergency medical services?” asked Assemblyman Michael Patrick Carroll (R-Morris).
A spokesman for Corzine said the cuts are unavoidable.
“The governor faced some tough choices, but he made the right decisions for working families in New Jersey,” said spokesman Robert Corrales, adding the proposed budget “invests in education and health care for children” and protects people most affected by the national economic crisis.
Because New Jersey has both paid and volunteer emergency medical services, paid EMTs generally work for commercial providers, and services are billed to the provider or the patient, Van Orden noted.
Rick Heller, 47, who has been with the Livingston First Aid Squad for 31 years, was one of hundreds of EMTs dressed in their blue rescue uniforms as the emergency lights from their ambulances lit up the Green last night.
“It’s a bad decision to plug the budget,” Heller said as emergency vehicles circled the Morristown Green, looking for places to park. “It’s stealing from Peter to pay Paul.”
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