Shaler Hampton EMS gets grant to help replace problematic ambulance

A state grant will help Shaler Hampton EMS replace a problematic ambulance that had broken down six times in less than two weeks, its chief said.

The Commonwealth Financing Authority awarded a $213,041 grant to the ambulance authority that serves Shaler, Hampton and Etna.

The grant comes from the Gaming Economic Development Tourism Fund, with money for the fund coming from gaming revenue.

The grant was supported by state Reps. Lindsay Powell and Arvind Venkat. State Reps. Lindsay Powell and Jeremy Shaffer also helped, Schmidt said.

Replacing this ambulance at this time had not been anticipated, Shaler Hampton EMS Chief Eric Schmidt said.

“We really are appreciative,” Schmidt said. “The increase in cost is really significant.”

The grant will cover about 76% of the new ambulance’s $280,000 cost, with the authority covering the rest, Schmidt said. It’s expected to arrive in early June.

“It will become part of our fleet,” Schmidt said. “It will look like the rest and be equipped like the rest and be more reliable in the fleet.”

Shaler Hampton EMS has a total of five ambulances. It staffs two in Shaler and one in Hampton, with two backups, and they rotate.

The one being replaced, its “fifth out,” was a 2017 and the oldest that was used for special events. When news of the grant came out on Nov. 18, it was out of service and in for a “very expensive repair,” Schmidt said.

“We hadn’t anticipated needing to replace it any time soon,” he said. “It just became apparent we had to do so.”

What will be done with it has not been decided.

“We must determine what the resale value will be after the repair versus the potential sale price ‘as is,’ ” Schmidt said.

Of the other four, two were acquired in 2021, with one of them funded by a grant, and two more were bought in 2024, again with one covered by a grant.

Going forward, Schmidt said the authority will run an ambulance for seven years, after which the box will be taken off the back and placed on a new chassis. That’s expected to cost 35% less than buying an entirely new ambulance.

That can’t be done with the 2017 ambulance being replaced, he said. Because the authority now uses ambulances with extended cabs, its box is too large to mount on such as chassis, and the compartments “are vastly different from what our design team settled on in 2021 and exists in all ambulances purchased since then.”