Oakmont has a new ambulance service provider.

Council unanimously voted at a special meeting Tuesday night to part ways with Lower Valley Ambulance Service in favor of O’Hara-based Parkview EMS.

Oakmont will pay Parkview $50,000 annually for services and allocate an additional $50,000 annually toward ambulance purchases, which are expected to be made in 2027 and 2033.

Borough residents are automatically subscribers to the ambulance service and don’t need to fill out any paperwork.

Subscribers receive a 75% discount for service.

Parkview will have a once-a-year donation fund drive in the borough as part of the deal, which has no expiration date.

“We’ve done our best in terms of due diligence, gathering information and (needed) to come to a resolution on this issue,” council president Lindsay Osterhout said. “I don’t think it’s good for our community to be influx on this. We have to provide this service, and we need to do so in the most fiscally responsible way that we can.”

Council’s move came after a presentation by Borough Manager Scot Fodi, who said the borough sprang into action following a Valley News Dispatch article in December about LVAS’s financial troubles.

“Ultimately, we all had to recognize that, like many other municipalities in the region, we were going to have to start contributing to an ambulance service probably on a regular basis,” Fodi said. “We had good knowledge the fact that this was going to start impacting our budgets moving forward.”

Lower Valley served Oakmont for about 50 years without an annual contribution from the borough.

The borough has about 6,750 residents in its slightly less than 1.8-square-mile area, according to the latest Census report.

Fodi reported there were 1,228 EMS dispatches to Oakmont last year, with 749 of those calls resulting in hospital transportation. Total calls also included 338 dispatches to the senior living facility Presbyterian Senior Care.

The nonprofit Lower Valley Ambulance Service reported it was in financial trouble because the reimbursement rate paid by insurance companies has not kept pace with the costs of providing services and rising inflation.

It recently asked the communities it serves to contribute $50 per resident each year.

The municipalities served are Cheswick, Harmar, Springdale, Springdale Township, a portion of Indiana Township, Verona and, now formerly, Oakmont.

“In order for LVAS to survive as they currently exist would require almost a buy-in by all the communities,” Oakmont Councilman John Arnold said Tuesday night. He said there was no indication the others would “buy in,” and was in favor of changing ambulance providers.

Arnold said the change to Parkview EMS was not a criticism of Lower Valley’s quality of service.

A committee, which included Fodi, Mayor Sophia Facaros, three council members and another Oakmont resident was formed to explore ambulance options.

They met with Plum EMS, Guardian Angel, Parkview EMS and Lower Valley Ambulance and gathered various information including potential response times into Oakmont, staffing, fleet, agency base location, existing debt and emergency support for the Oakmont Volunteer Fire Department.

Fodi said each entity was asked the same questions, and there were no formal negotiations as part of the information gathering. Some did not provide as detailed responses as others, the manager said.

Information provided was later categorized into four grades: exceeds expectations, meets expectations, acceptable and not preferred.

Parkview EMS reached the exceeds expectations level in more criteria than the other companies examined, according to the presentation.

“The committee has briefed the council members at various stages of this process so that everybody is not just looking at the presentation the borough manager put together tonight for the first time,” Councilman David Brankley said Tuesday. “All of these meetings with the various ambulance services were discussed, and the options were compared prior to tonight on an informal basis.

“The committee as a whole is unanimous in our belief that Parkview (EMS) is the best option going forward for Oakmont.”

A copy of the presentation is available for review at the borough office, 767 Fifth St.

Lower Valley Ambulance Service Director Jamey Lavelle said there is an agreement with Oakmont made years ago that stipulates a 45-day notice must be given before terminating service.

Lavelle declined further comment about council’s actions.

Fodi said he searched borough records and could not find any such paperwork.

He said Parkview EMS would be responding to Oakmont calls immediately.

A Parkview EMS staffer deferred questions about adding Oakmont to the coverage area to Chief Tom Heilmann, who could not be reached Tuesday evening. Plum EMS officials declined to comment.

Oakmont officials were asked why they did not get any information from nearby Penn Hills EMS.

Fodi said he reached out to the municipality, and they indicated Penn Hills EMS did not want to expand its services. He noted they were all municipal employees and not a separate nonprofit entity.

Penn Hills EMS supervisor Diane Fitzhenry said she watched the Oakmont meeting online and was surprised by Fodi’s comments about her department.

Fitzhenry said she and municipal Manager Scott Andrejchak received no such correspondence.

“Had we received any requests, we would have responded one way or another,” Fitzhenry said.

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