Ambulance report: 199 calls in May; police cite increased training and response metrics

Matt Wagner, who presented the township's ambulance report, told the board the service handled 199 calls in May and 170 year-to-date in Cumru. He gave a breakdown of call types (including 75 ALS medical and 31 BLS medical calls) and said 78% of calls resulted in transport to a hospital, with 82% of transports going to Reading. He said average dispatch-to-route time was 1 minute, 8 seconds and average response time 8 minutes, 13 seconds; total call time averaged just under 57 minutes.

The details matter because they set expectations for resource needs and mutual-aid coordination. "Seventy-eight percent of our calls were transported to the hospital," Wagner said, describing the unit's workload and where patients were taken. Board members asked whether any unusual trends appeared; ambulance staff listed typical summer upticks — more motorcycle incidents and other seasonal patterns — and said nothing outside normal municipal variation had been observed.

Police Chief Winchester reviewed department key-performance indicators and pointed to a recent spike in training. "That increase is due to our mandatory in-service trainings and the first round of firearms and defense-tactics training," she said, explaining why training metrics rose this month. Winchester also described repeat-call locations (notably a 24-hour gas station the department monitors) and summarized recent investigative successes: a suspect arrested after a break-in at a Lancaster Avenue Little Caesars and identified suspects in multiple vehicle thefts.

Board members pressed on resource thresholds and staffing. Winchester said doubling the repeat-call rate at identified hotspots would trigger further review; she also reported the civil-service hiring list was certified, allowing the department to fill vacancies from a prepared list of eligible candidates. On response-time metrics, staff noted the KPI report used seconds for internal presentation but that minutes-and-seconds conversions remain the public's best reference.

Why it matters: the ambulance and police metrics guide near-term budgeting and staffing decisions (training costs, overtime, and hiring). The board confirmed that notices about community-day road closures and no-parking restrictions will be published and hand-delivered to affected residents.

The board took no separate formal vote on the reports themselves; they accepted the updates and asked staff to continue publicly posting KPI material and to explore sharing a monthly visual summary for residents.

The board adjourned the discussion with no immediate policy changes; staff said they will return with further operational and budget implications as necessary.