City emergency response times got longer

  

NY Post

New York City first responders are taking longer to get to fires, medical emergencies and crimes in progress.

Critics blamed the potential deadly surge in response times on serious staffing shortages in the NYPD and FDNY.

As the Police Department continues to deal with spikes in major crimes and a mass exodus of cops, response times to all “crimes in progress” during the past fiscal year ending June 30 increased from 11 minutes and 40 seconds to 12 minutes and 44 seconds – or 9.1%, according to Mayor Adams’ first management report.

In fiscal 2019, which predated the COVID-19 pandemic and the many new challenges it to brought citywide, the average response time was 9 minutes and 55 seconds.

The Fiscal 2022 Mayor’s Management Report released late Friday – which covers the highs and lows of all city agencies during the final six months of ex-Mayor Bill de Blasio’s administration and the first six of Adams’ – also highlighted a serious uptick specifically in response times to armed robberies, burglaries and other “critical crimes.”

Cops on average responded off 911 calls to these crimes in 8 minutes and 26 seconds, compared to 7 minutes and 52 seconds a year ago.  In fiscal 2019, they arrived on average in 6 minutes and 38 seconds after a 911 dispatcher fielded the call for help.  

Councilwoman Joann Ariola (R-Queens), who chairs the fire and emergency management committee, blamed de Blasio’s progressive policies for helping nudge many cops who felt “disrespected” into early retirement and leaving the NYPD short-staffed.

24,000

Diversity in action

 NY Post

More than 24,000 city workers will be forced to stay home Monday when Mayor de Blasio’s COVID-19 vaccine mandate goes into effect, raising concerns about the impact on emergency response times in the five boroughs.

“That’s the question everyone’s asking: How many more minutes will it take to respond, how many more lives will be lost as a result?” one Manhattan patrol cop told The Post on Sunday.

“There’s a correlation between time and mortality that a lot of people in City Hall don’t understand. Unfortunately, the only way they’re going to get the message is by seeing the numbers rise and rise. And seeing how crime is already on the rise, they really need to look at their priorities and decide if this is a good idea, and they need to do it soon.”

Despite a 14 percent bump in the number of city government workers who have gotten at least one shot since de Blasio announced the mandate on Oct. 20, thousands of others would still rather be placed on unpaid leave than get jabbed.

 

Vaccinated Danny Dromm calls firefighters and E.M.T.'s cowards

Didn't see you trying to put out that apartment building inferno in your district that displaced 400 of your constituents you #vaccinated coward.https://t.co/mcYhAKL3Vo

— This is JQ LLC (@ImpunityCity) October 30, 2021

City workers against vaccism

 

Eyewitness News 

 New York City municipal employees marched across the Brooklyn Bridge against the COVID vaccine mandate.

The protest was set to end in front of City Hall on the Manhattan side of the bridge and was billed as an anti-mandate protest on behalf of nearly 50,000 NYC employees who have yet to be vaccinated.

Mayoral candidate Curtis Sliwa was at the protest and said he is opposed to the mandates.

"I think especially these draconian measures that all civil servants have to be vaccinated or they get fired, we already don't have enough cops, we don't have enough correction officers, we don't have enough health care workers, we don't have enough teachers," Sliwa told Eyewitness News. "So, who's getting hurt by all of us, obviously, students, citizens, people who need services. Stop this nonsense, and the mandate."

Sliwa said the workers should be encouraged to be vaccinated, but if they can't or won't, weekly testing should be allowed.

Monday's demonstration follows a protest Sunday night at the Barclay's Center in support of Kyrie Irving.

Ridgewood EMS is coming to town

 

Queens Chronicle

The Ridgewood Volunteer Ambulance Corps recently announced that its plan for 2021 involves extending community-based volunteer EMS services to Woodhaven, Richmond Hill and Kew Gardens.

In December, the RVAC submitted a formal application of area expansion with the New York City Regional Emergency Medical Services Council to provide services into those communities.

A few years ago, the Woodhaven-Richmond Hill Volunteer Corps lost its right to operate due to administrative troubles, according to Kevin Mahoney, RVAC board vice-chairman. Eager to resume coverage, the board of the defunct South Queens volunteer group reached out to the RVAC to partner and get back up and running under the Ridgewood banner.

“It’s easy for us to put in an expansion as opposed for them to start over as a new ambulance service,” said Mahoney.

Mahoney said the group is hoping to get the expansion on the agenda in a February NYC REMSCO meeting, when the body would vote on it. If approved, the application would then head over to the state.

The move comes after a series of successful mergers for the ambulance corps.

In 2019, RVAC, which serves parts of Brooklyn as well as Queens, incorporated the Glendale VAC and Middle Village VAC. According to a press release the group sent out, the mergers have allowed it to centralize its clinical services and operational efficiency. The three entities now serve together as one unified EMS service.

The mergers have reinvigorated the RVAC’s volunteerism and allowed a stronger response to the pandemic, it said.

Chirlane McCray's ThriveNYC program and personal media entourage has to be funded somehow...

NY Post

“People will die” if City Hall follows through with a plan to lay off nearly 400 EMTs and paramedics, the head of the union representing those workers told The Post.

Oren Barzilay, head of EMS Local 2507, said FDNY brass told him that 10 percent of the city’s 3,700 EMTs and paramedics will be cut under Mayor Bill de Blasio’s plan to slash 22,000 municipal workers.

“The response times will go through the roof. That would put people at risk. People will die,” Barzilay warned.

De Blasio has said the reductions will come in October if the city doesn’t get state or federal aid to fill a major budget deficit caused by the coronavirus. Earlier this month he ordered agencies to come up with lists of cuts, according to Politico.

The number of EMTs and paramedics has already dropped from 4,100 before the pandemic. Four of his members died from the virus and three others committed suicide, Barzilay said. They were on the frontline of the crisis, rushing patients to hospitals around the five boroughs.

During the pandemic, his members responded to 7,000 emergency 911 calls, nearly double the normal amount.

“We were the only ones going into homes to save lives. That’s what we did. This is the thanks the men and women from EMS are now getting,” Barzilay fumed.

“COVID is not over. What happens if there is a surge?” he asked.
Reps for FDNY and City Hall did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Another union source said the cuts are nearly inconceivable.

“I don’t know where they would trim EMS, we are understaffed,” said Anthony Almojera, vice president of EMS Local 3621.

Dead baby abandoned in Bayside park turns out to be a toy.

 

QNS


An infant who was allegedly found dead in Bayside’s Crocheron Park turned out to be a lifelike doll set up by a sick prankster, according to police.

Multiple sources confirmed that what was initially believed to be the body of a deceased infant was actually a doll “made to look like it was decomposing.”

At around 8:15 a.m. on June 18, officers from the 111th Precinct responded to a call about a baby who was unconscious and unresponsive in the vicinity of 215th Street and 35th Avenue. A runner had reportedly stumbled upon the baby’s body around 7:40 a.m.

The report triggered a massive response by the NYPD and the Fire Department. Nearby residents were alarmed by the response. People in Bayside who heard about what had allegedly occurred took to social media to express their shock and condolences.

But then the truth was uncovered.

 

Reports later confirmed that the “baby” was actually a doll that was colored pink and blue, which police described as “very realistic.” The fake baby was so realistic that it initially fooled NYPD and EMS personnel who responded to the scene.

It’s not clear, at this point in the investigation, who planted the doll in the park and called in the “dead baby” report, nor did police know of a possible motive for the sick ruse. They are currently searching for cameras in the park to see if they can catch the culprit.

Despite this being a warped prank played by some stupid asshole(s) that wasted emergency service time from the citizenry, how the living hell the cops and the EMT's could not tell that it was a doll?

City mechanic does good by taxpayers

From CBS 2:

A mechanic for the New York City fire department is being honored for saving taxpayers hundreds of thousands of dollars through his ingenuity.

Jomar Pichardo’s job is to keep the city’s fleet of EMS ambulances running while working out of the department’s garage in the Long Island City section of Queens.

“I just like tinkering with stuff, so if I see something that can be fixed I’ll pretty much find a way to fix it,” Pichardo said.

He has saved the FDNY more than $700,000 annually by inventing ways to refurbish ambulance batteries and car parts that would normally be tossed away and replaced.

Pichardo created a charging room to squeeze extra life out of ambulance batteries, WCBS 880’s Sean Adams reported.

Children die in preventable Far Rockaway fire

From NY1:

Investigators say a child playing with a lighter sparked a deadly fire in Queens over the weekend that killed two small children.

Authorities say Jai'Launi and Aniya Tinglin, both 4 years old, suffered smoke inhalation as flames quickly spread late Saturday night inside their grandfathers' home on Bay 30th Street in Far Rockaway.

They were both pronounced dead at the hospital.

Officials say the lighter ignited their grandfather's mattress.

A third sibling, 4-year-old Laylani Tinglin, and the childrens' 63-year-old grandfather are recovering at the hospital, along with a 55-year-old woman who is a tenant.

Officials say there were no working smoke detectors inside the home.

The fire is also calling ambulance response times into question.

Within minutes of the first 911 call at 11:51 p.m., firefighters were on the scene. However, EMS was not assigned to respond until 12:05 a.m., and ultimately did not arrive until more than 20 minutes after the initial call.

From the Daily News:

Estelle Jackson, 80, the kids’ great grandmother, said the children had been visiting their grandfather at the home and were in the basement when the blaze began.

It's also been brought to my attention that the scene of a tragic New Year's fire that took the life of another child has been cited for illegal conversion of the basement and illegal electrical wiring.

It's so sad when kids die due to the transgressions of adults.

It takes almost 10 minutes to get an ambulance

From the NY Post:

Fire Department ambulances take 9 minutes and 22 seconds on average to arrive at medical emergencies from the time a call is first placed to 911, new city data shows.

It’s the first time that the city has been able to measure response times from the time a call is placed rather than from the time a call is assigned to the FDNY or NYPD dispatcher.

The previous measurement put ambulance response times to life-threatening medical emergencies at 6 minutes and 45 seconds — a nearly 3-minute difference that alarmed City Council members.

“I’m troubled by the new numbers I’ve seen,” Fire and Criminal Justice Services Committee Chair Elizabeth Crowley (D-Queens) said Thursday morning at a budget hearing at City Hall. “Nine minutes and 22 seconds for life-threatening emergencies is too high.”

Homeless to be removed from E train

From DNA Info:

The NYPD and the MTA plan to clear homeless men and women out of the subway system after a skyrocketing number of people have sought shelter there from the brutally cold winter, police officials said.

The plan, which is set to begin before dawn on Monday, comes amid an upswing in homeless people in the subway system during the exceptionally cold winter. There were more than 1,800 people living on the subways in 2013, up from 1,000 in 2009, according to the city's annual HopeNYC street survey.

Starting Monday at 3 a.m., teams of transit workers, NYPD officers and emergency medical technicians will go to the E train stations at Jamaica Center and at the World Trade Center, officials said.

Each time a train pulls into one of the two stations, teams will check each car, and take all the homeless people inside to either a shelter or hospitals, officials said.

The trains will then be cleaned for the morning rush hour.

Queens people behaving badly

From the NY Post:

Cops responding to a domestic dispute in Queens Sunday found a squalid apartment filled with endangered children, abused pit bulls, dangerous snakes and a lizard.

Cops took Jasean Holmes from the run-down Richmond Hill flat, and arrested them both after seeing evidence of animal cruelty and danger to the five children.

Sources said cops have been called to the house dozens of times on domestic disputes, but never arrested the father because his wife would not press charges.

But this time, sources said, Holmes, 29, tangled with his wife after an EMS unit responded, and crew members witnessed the attack.

The EMS crew had actually arrived on the scene first around 8 a.m. in response to a call that someone had been bitten by a dog.

There, they saw the couple squabbling outside their home, and called police when the man started beating his wife and kicking one of the dogs.

Cops who arrived found four children, ages 7 through 11, in their apartment, along with five adult pit bulls, 10 pit bull puppies, two boa constrictor snakes and a lizard.

Holmes was charged with aggravated cruelty to animals, torturing or injuring animals, acting in a manner injurious to a child, and assault for allegedly hitting his wife.

It was unclear if the woman would face any charges.

From the NY Post:

A tipsy squabble outside a strip club erupted into a bizarre catfight — complete with the stabbing of a helpful bystander — in Queens early Saturday, cops said.

A jealous threesome of women — Teira Fisher, 29, Tamara Fuller, 26, and Jazmine Smith — allegedly followed two other ladies from a nightclub to Riviera Gentleman’s Club in Astoria because they were mad the gals had gotten into the VIP section even though they were rejected.

The nightlife bullies then started hollering high-school-style insults such as “Snob!” and “You’re stuck up!” before punching the poor ladies in the face at around 3:15 a.m., according to police.

A bystander tried to break up the catty smackdown, but a boyfriend of one of the attackers then stabbed the good Samaritan in the thigh and cheek with a sharp object, police sources said.

The three women and the boyfriend, Robert Annunziatta, were charged with harassment and assault, police sources said.

When calling 911 gets you nowhere

From the Queens Gazette:

On Tuesday August 21 at about 3:15 in the afternoon a black Honda Civic driven by a resident of Elmhurst struck a Toyota Highlander driven by Marta Valasquez, a Flushing woman who was carrying her sister, Maria Mora, and her new 8-day old nephew, Juaquin, in the back seat.

The Highlander had minor visible damages but the Honda had major damages with the front end looking like an accordion.

What makes this apparently typical bump and dent collision of interest is the fact that Marta Valasquez, called 911 from her cell phone at 3:22pm, and an hour later when no police or EMS responded to the accident scene she dialed 911 again on her iPhone only to have the call and report to a 911 dispatcher ignored a second time as evidenced by no police or EMS sent to the accident scene.

More than two hours following the accident a Manhattan bound NYPD van from Manhattan North traffic detail was passing the accident site and pulled over to inquire if anyone was injured.

Cooper Avenue flooding almost claims 3 lives

From the Daily News:

Sister Claudia Bradshaw and her two pals, caught off guard by a flash flood, were trapped in a sinking car beneath a Queens overpass Wednesday afternoon.

Bradshaw, 86, prayed for deliverance, while her friends frantically called 911. The water was up to Bradshaw’s neck when her prayers were answered — by a pair of plucky Fire Department EMT’s.

Fighting through the pelting rain into a deep puddle that quickly became 7 feet of angry, swirling water, Marilyn Arroyo and Jimmy Guailacela pulled the nun and her friends out — just before the swamped Lexus went under.

Arroyo said they’re glad they didn’t wait for firefighters to arrive, which is what they would usually do.

Big waste of money for tracking systems

From NY1:

Two new audits by the City Comptroller John Liu's office show the city has wasted millions of dollars on global positioning systems for fire and sanitation trucks.

Liu says the pricey systems are faulty, showing tracking information that sometimes indicated the trucks were in the water.

The units installed in some sanitation vehicles cost more than the vehicles themselves, according to Liu.

He also says the New York City Fire Department spent more than $7 million to outfit fire and EMS vehicles, which works out to more than $10,000 per unit.

Another car crash at Queens Plaza

From Fox 5:

A car slammed into a store in Long Island City on Wednesday just over one week after a similar incident in the same location.

Two people were seriously injured at around 4:30 a.m. on Wednesday when the driver of a 2006 Volkswagen Jetta driving Queens-bound on the lower level of the Queensboro Bridge lost control and crashed into a building at Crescent Street and Queens Plaza, said police.

The 39-year-old driver was arrested at the scene. Charges are pending. EMS officials told FOX 5 News that the driver suffered a partial arm amputation. He was taken Bellevue Hospital in serious condition.

A 40-year-old passenger suffered head trauma, police said. She was taken to New York Cornell Hospital in critical condition.

The outer roadway to the Queensboro Bridge was closed.

Watch yourself in the park

From A Walk in the Park:

A 50 year-old male was attacked 3/27/11 by 4 youths while playing tennis at the World’s Fair Playground (Grand Central Pkwy. & 62nd Dr.) In Flushing Meadows Corona Park. The attack happened just before 10 A.M. The victim was struck in the head and face and suffered cuts and bruises. NYPD and EMS responded to the scene. The man was transported by EMS to Elmhurst Hospital. - Geoffrey Croft

From A Walk in the Park:

A female jogger reported an attempted sexual assault in Forest Park at Union Turnpike & Margaret Pl. at 1:00 P.M. 3/25/11. NYPD (112 Pct) responded to the park to investigate. They searched the area with negative results. - Geoffrey Croft

9/11 bureaucracy still in business

From the NY Post:

I am advocating that the mayor, who controls half of the LMDC board, use his clout to secure half of the remaining LMDC war chest ($350 million) to be used to keep New York safe and secure over the next five years.

Despite the fact that there has been no successful terrorist attack on our city in the last nine years, New York clearly remains the No. 1 target for terrorists. The May 1, 2010, attempted car bombing in Times Square illustrates this.

NYPD Commissioner Ray Kelly has said there have been 11 failed terrorist plots against our city since 9/11. Continuing staff cuts to the NYPD and FDNY are a clear threat to public safety.

In February, Mayor Bloomberg reduced staffing levels on FDNY companies to save about $15 million a year. He has once again proposed closing 20 fire companies effective July 1 to save another $30 million, while the NYPD head count has been reduced by over 6,000 officers.

Crime statistics are rising in the wake of these cuts, and the mayor’s February staffing reductions have already left hundreds of families homeless and led to unnecessary fire deaths.

By simply earmarking $70 million per year for the next five years from the LMDC, the city can put more police officers on the street and keep firehouses fully staffed and open. This infusion of cash for public safety will ensure that New York remains the safest large city in America. Safety and security are the main ingredients for a strong and thriving economy. This is a smart investment at this time that will pay dividends for New York and its taxpayers.

For the life of me, I can't understand why NYC continually bleeds its first responder agencies dry. FDNY, EMS, NYPD, etc., should have the most money spent on their needs, should have the most personnel, and should have the most up-to-date, functional equipment. The city will certainly head down the crapper if there is no money for basic emergency services. No one wants to see headlines like this one or worry what will happen in the event of a large scale emergency (like the tornado/microburst or the Dec 26th snowstorm). Stop spending money on tweeding programs and losing out on revenue by providing developer tax breaks which only serve to overwhelm the systems in place and instead focus on crime and fire prevention.

2 construction workers die in fall

From the NY Post:

Two construction workers were killed today in a five-story fall at an Upper West Side building site, authorities said.

The men, who were not wearing harnesses, were seven stories up in the project at 150 West 83rd St. when the beam they were working on gave way around 10:35 a.m., authorities said.

They fell five stories down an under-construction elevator shaft.

EMTs struggled to revive both men at the scene before they were rushed to separate hospitals.

"In the process of the EMTs trying to revive him [one worker], they said he was having a heart attack," said witness Anthony Alvarado, 24.

"The other guy was on a stretcher, and you couldn’t tell if he was alive or not."

A 49-year-old worker was declared dead at Roosevelt Hospital, and a 51-year-old worker was declared dead at St. Luke’s Hospital.

Police and the Department of Buildings are investigating.

A little defensive, are we?

His approval rating has plummeted, so he demoted the EMS Chief and 2 Sanitation bosses. He also is rolling out new measures for snow removal. Fun in the above video starts at 9:45.