The Scarsdale Volunteer Ambulance Corps (SVAC) was founded in 1970 by a group of concerned citizens who joined together with a goal to provide improved emergency services for the Scarsdale community. Over several months, they recruited other residents and eventually procured a 1956 Cadillac ambulance donated by the Mt. Kisco Lions Club.
Although Village officials were cool to the idea of a volunteer-led ambulance corps, they soon realized the potential and offered use of the old railroad station located at the Five Corners near Heathcote Road.
Initial fundraising and recruitment campaigns were highly successful and, by 1971, SVAC had enrolled more than 30 people to support emergency services in the Village.
SVAC leaders then proceeded to expand its service capability by training multiple volunteers as New York State Certified Emergency Medical Technicians. Thanks to ongoing financial support of the Scarsdale community, they were able to obtain a modular ambulance and add a second garage space to their headquarters. It was clear that something special was emerging in Scarsdale.
Within four years, SVAC had built an agency fueled by volunteers willing to help their neighbors at any time of night or day, which surpassed the level of service being provided by the Village. In 1974, the Village officially designated SVAC as the agency responsible for all medical emergencies and transportation.
During the 50 years since its founding, the demand on SVAC, as well as other emergency care providers, has grown substantially, due in part to the realization among emergency health care providers that patient outcomes are significantly improved by employing pre-hospital protocols to treat patients prior to transport. This new model of care has required significantly more training, and more time engaging with the patient.
By the early 2000's, it was obvious that the railroad station was barely adequate for current needs, and completely inadequate for emerging demands. Informal discussions commenced with Village officials, and together a consensus was reached that an empty piece of property at 5 Weaver Street not only was centrally located in the SVAC service area but also large enough to accommodate a new facility which would address the organization's growing mission. Blueprints for the proposed new structure were drawn and, with active support of Scarsdale Mayor Strauss, a successful fundraising campaign was undertaken, resulting in a 99-year lease with the Village for the property at 5 Weaver Street, and a new facility which did not require the use of any Village funds. The new building, which opened in February 2009, provides state of the art medical equipment, two ambulance bays, sleeping quarters for ten people, an oxygen filling system, a working kitchen, squad room and training space. It is a source of community pride within the Village.
The move into the new facility marked the onset of a significant growth period for SVAC as a training hub, both internally as well as outside the Village. While the agency will always be measured by its core mission of responding to 911 calls quickly and effectively, exceeding the national average response time of 7 minutes, today SVAC undertakes a tremendous amount of training and development and planning that occurs behind the scenes, and often widely unnoticed.
The new facility has provided SVAC the opportunity to serve as a regional EMS training facility serving first responders, not only in Scarsdale, but throughout the surrounding communities. As one of only four New York State Department of Health certified EMT training centers in Westchester, SVAC's expert educators provide up-to-date instruction, including continuing medical education, for hundreds of new and existing EMTs.
Further, in collaboration with Scarsdale High School, SVAC recently expanded its program options to offer a fully certified New York State EMT class to interested SHS students as a senior options elective each May. This popular course, which typically fills to capacity, gives these students, many of whom are considering pre-medicine majors, a competitive advantage when entering college. In addition to earning EMT certification, they gain the advantage of experiencing real-world medical situations, and these students often join a college campus ambulance corps, and gain a lifelong appreciation for volunteering.
In addition to the initiatives described above, SVAC has in recent years become a leader in organizing and hosting community-level emergency training exercises involving key area agencies, including EMS and Fire. These include mass casualty scenarios, such as a school bus accident, as well as multiple active shooter drills. These simulations require hundreds of hours to prepare and depict real-life scenarios through actors in moulage, sometimes including simulated gunfire. Since planning of such large-scale events involve coordination with neighboring communities, they frequently send their own personnel to SVAC's training events. Participants from the County Department of Emergency Services, as well as physicians from White Plains Hospital assist with communication and skills evaluation. Without SVAC's commitment to education, this high level of preparation would remain unfulfilled.
Finally, SVAC recognizes that all members of our community can benefit from basic levels of emergency preparedness. Therefore, the ambulance corps staff regularly teaches CPR classes under the guidelines of the American Heart Association that cover infant, child and adult choking rescue and resuscitation. Stop the Bleed training empowers bystanders to help in a bleeding emergency, and is geared not just to individuals, but community religious organizations, school staff, and local community clubs.
Within the emergency services community, Scarsdale Volunteer Ambulance Corps is considered among the best EMS agencies in Westchester County (volunteer, municipal or commercial) for its operational and training excellence. In 2018, the organization responsible for overseeing and coordinating EMS operations in the County, the Westchester Regional EMS Council, awarded SVAC the Chairman's Award and, separately, its president, David Raizen, has twice been awarded the EMS Leadership Award.
There may be a perception in some circles that volunteer ambulance corps agencies are less capable than municipal or commercial agencies. With that in mind, it is important to know that all EMS agencies in New York State are required to follow the same protocols and procedures, regardless of their structure, and all operate under the direction of medical doctors. The highest level of pre-hospital care allowed is called Advanced Life Support (ALS). ALS is provided by certified paramedics, and allows them to bring the two dozen most critical life-saving drugs and field procedures directly to a patient. In nearly all cases, a hospital ER performs the exact same interventions as a paramedic performs in the field, except they can start them sooner to yield better results.
Scarsdale always has a paramedic on its first due ambulance, and nearly always does on its second and third due. In addition to paramedics, the ambulances include certified EMTs who can administer Basic Life Support medications and procedures. They employ a combination of paid and volunteer paramedics and EMTs to ensure the Village is always covered.
Call volume has steadily increased over the years. In the past five years alone, the number of calls SVAC has responded to has increased 55%. On average, SVAC responds to five calls per day, or more than 1,800 a year.
Due to the operational success of SVAC, they are able to cover 99.7% of all calls received. More than a quarter of these calls are from neighboring towns who are unable to cover their own calls. Through a countywide system known as "mutual aid," towns help neighboring towns to reduce delay to patient care. While SVAC rarely needs help from others, they are often called by Eastchester, New Rochelle, Mount Vernon, Yonkers and Greenburgh.
In 2016, due to the high volume of mutual aid into the north end of New Rochelle, SVAC was asked by the City of New Rochelle to take the area north of Stratton Road as part of its primary response area. They conducted a joint experiment where SVAC and New Rochelle's commercial ambulance service were dispatched to calls simultaneously to the north end. SVAC was first on-scene more than 90% of the time, and was almost four minutes faster on average. In 2017, with the permission of the Village Manager and then-Mayor Jon Mark, Scarsdale Volunteer Ambulance Corps officially took over the area.
Since SVAC is partially funded by medical insurance chargebacks, the additional territory has helped fund the agency and provide a new set of donors.
Presently, SVAC has:
It is believed that the next 50 years will see continued growth in the corps, particularly as the landscape of medicine changes. Currently, they are working on three major initiatives.
The first involves being one of the first community paramedicine programs in the area. Community paramedicine is a relatively new and evolving healthcare model whereby paramedics and EMTs assist with primary healthcare and preventive services. This has the potential to expand the corps role from predominantly reactive to proactive.
The second initiative is a joint effort with Westchester County to set up a mass evacuation transportation system. Their immediate concern is for the evacuation of the Ambassador of Scarsdale senior living facility, but any protocol established would be used throughout the County.
Finally, the third is continuing to grow and evolve their training facility. The corps success today is owed to the desire of their members to be life-long learners. In emergency medicine, there is no such thing as "knowing it all" and they are proud of their tradition of being among the most prepared agencies in the County.
The past 50 years of Scarsdale Volunteer Ambulance Corps has been about neighbors helping neighbors. What started as a small group of dedicated volunteers and a radical idea they could do something better, has evolved into a large organization that thousands have come to count on within four minutes of calling 911.
It is a special group of people who volunteer to help their community in their time of need, and they treat the responsibility with great passion and personal time. As they are adamant about privacy protection, you will rarely read about the thousands of patients they've helped in the Inquirer or online. They often go unrecognized. They see humanity at its worst, while believing they represent humanity at its best. Their members give of themselves not just to help their community, but because indeed, it defines their community.