GREENBACKVILLE, VA - Saving seconds could mean saving lives during a medical emergency. So two years ago, Accomack County sought to address its understaffed emergency medical response infrastructure.
County Administrator Mike Mason said it was around this time that the Department of Public Safety established its own accredited recruitment and training academy. This program aimed to create a pipeline, recruiting individuals with no prior experience and graduating them as advanced EMTs ready to outfit the County's EMS response.
"Greenbackville was an area where our response time was past the response time metric that we use to determine where we need staffing," Mason said.
Five newly trained advanced EMTs graduated Friday, some of whom will start working at the Greenbackville Volunteer Fire Company on April 13. The facility will have at least two fire medics staffed 24 hours, 7 days a week.
Some people in the nearby residential community of Captain's Cove have experienced the anxieties that accompany waiting longer for first responders during a medical emergency due to the previous understaffing at Greenbackville.
"Being sort of rural and out of the ways as we are, you have a severe medical issue; you need treatment," John Hvizda, who calls Captain's Cove his home away from home in retirement, said. "The longer you wait, the more dangerous a bad outcome can become."
Hvizda said he had experienced this firsthand on multiple occasions.
"Both my wife and I have had occasions that we've had emergency situations," Hvizda said. "My wife, in the middle of the night, had to be taken down to Riverside Hospital."
Riverside Shore Memorial Hospital in Onancock is Captain's Cove's closest hospital, about a 45-minute drive away, making swift EMS response critical.
"Greenbackville is five minutes down the road," Tom Barton, also of Captain's Cove, said. "Making it strategically the only solution for response time."
The increased staffing of Greenbackville comes as officials consider a real estate tax hike to support EMS operations throughout Accomack County.
Barton said he thinks encouraging more development in communities like Captain's Cove could generate more revenue without increasing the existing tax rate on residents, many of whom are on fixed incomes in retirement.
"Can you imagine if there was something that would incentivize or help this cove grow more homes and add another thousand homes paying full taxes?" Barton said. "What would that do? It'd be awesome."
The Accomack County Board of Supervisors is scheduled to vote on the budget and proposed tax increases during a meeting on Monday, April 14.