Board wants ambulance company’s insurance to cover town

Members of the Esopus Town Board members have asked the Town of Esopus Volunteer Ambulance Squad to have its insurance carrier cover the town in its certificate of liability.

At a Town Board meeting Monday, squad members requested that a contract for coverage drop wording about “malpractice” in regard to patient care.

“New York state does not require us to carry malpractice insurance, so we don’t have it,” squad Capt. Brian Parr said.

The contract states that a “malpractice policy shall be in limits of $1 million per person and $2 million per accident and shall further hold the town harmless of any and all liability arising out of acts of omission arising out of performance of this agreement.”

Squad members said the term “malpractice” refers to actions taken by nurses and doctors.

Board members, who were not sure when the contract was written, said the town needs to be covered by an insurance policy because they are concerned about lawsuits.

“I did call ... our insurance man and he was very leery of this,” town Supervisor Diane McCord said. “You know they’re going to come after the town no matter what happens. So if we could get a certificate saying that we’re covered under (an) umbrella policy if something happened, then I think that would be all right.”

Rescue squad Trustee Mike Lange also asked that board members consider restoring $20,000 in town funding toward the squad. He noted the cut made about six years ago reduced the town’s contribution by half.

“We do close to 900 and 1,000 calls a year,” he said. “So all we’re asking is if you guys could given any consideration to putting maybe $5,000 back in every year starting next year ... just to (get us) back up to $40,000.”

Parr said the squad budget is based on the amount reimbursed by insurance companies, which has made it difficult to keep up with expenses.

“The insurance companies want to pay less and less,” he said. “We’re still a volunteer agency -- actually, the way that we operate and the way that our money comes in is we bill insurance companies, but we don’t send town residents to collection. We’re not looking to hurt anybody’s credit or anything like that, but if there’s an insurance company to pay us for the service that we provide, we do that.”