In the article about the new Island Property plan for Oyster Bay, the predicament of the local firefighters reponding to multiple emergency calls related to senior housing areas came up again on May 15 at the Oyster Bay Civic Association meeting.

At the previous meeting of the Oyster Bay Civic Association two firemen expressed some of their concerns - speaking as private people and not as spokespersons for the firefighters.

The firefighters are in an interesting position. They are volunteers and love what they do to help the community and don't want to complain. Still, when we hear that more seniors are being welcomed into the community, it does pose a problem.

At some level, the community has to think over who should be responsible for ambulance service. Should the firefighters continue to man the ambulance as volunteers? Should the community step in and begin paying for ambulance responders? Should a crew be paid for being on call 24-hours a day for emergency calls? Should a business that deals with senior citizens who need assisted living facilities also have to provide ambulance service along with other amenities like phone service, food, electricity and security?

It seems to us that if your business is based on providing a better quality of living for seniors, that is just one of the things that business has to provide.

Local residents who age here as part of their natural history, as Dr. Robert Romanelli put it, are not a business. The average homeowner does not have to provide ambulance service for the family. We use our cars when needed and only for dire circumstances, need to ask help from the greater community for a resource such as an ambulance.

We think there should be a town ordinance that states if a business operates serving an exclusive or almost exclusive population of seniors, they have to take on the natural job of providing emergency transportation for their clients.

There is obviously an interesting and long discussion that can be initiated by this suggestion. We think it is time for the problem to be put out in the open for a community decision. That is what we always think town hearings are about, and sometimes they are. Do you remember when the town wanted to change the way the boat slips were given out. That proposal was met with a roomful of boaters saying "NO." We never heard it discussed again.

Let's have an open discussion and see what needs to be done before we run ragged the few wonderful volunteers we are lucky enough to have. We don't want them to see themselves as being used by others.

That we think is the problem.

-DFK