The Mohawk Valley Ambulance Corps (MOVAC) tries to have top-of-the-line equipment to provide the best care possible for the community they serve, and it’s a big community.

“Total square mileage, we’ve mapped it out pretty well by township, is around 290 to 300 square miles,” MOVAC President Greg Eisenhut said.

All that travel translates to a lot of fuel - about 2,500 gallons a month, according to Eisenhut. He said they try to take that cost into account when budgeting their year, a budget that’s usually adopted in December prior to gas soaring above $4 a gallon.

Eisenhut said MOVAC’s major income source is patient payments from insurance companies, but there are issues with patients not paying their bills. This problem is intensified for MOVAC as prices keep going up.

When it comes to gas alone, he said, “We’re looking at the increase alone since early last year of almost $46,000.”

Funding for ambulance organizations looks different than funding for fire departments.

Even among fire departments, funding methods vary. But the issues caused by rising fuel prices are impacting everyone.

Jared Pearl has been with the Maynard Volunteer Fire Department for 30 years, eight of those as chief. 

Pearl said their trucks, some holding 75 gallons of gas, are filled once or twice a week.

“We’re out doing different things,” Pearl said. “When we get new firefighters in, we have to do driver training. We’re not gonna let somebody get in a piece of apparatus that’s three-quarters of a million dollars and drive it. They have to learn it. They have to be certified in it.”

Maynard gets most of its fuel at the state’s rate, but Pearl said that rate has also gone up.

Inflation on necessary equipment, gear and supplies isn’t making things easier.

“We complete our budget proposal in August,” Pearl said. “You try to compare it off of the year before, what you spend, and then now. Now, with the inflation going up on everything, equipment, training, everything, even just gas, diesel, you couldn’t predict that.”

For Maynard Fire Department, that means some new purchases may have to go on hold.

“We’re toeing the line,” Pearl said. “We may put off some purchases that we do not necessarily need right away until the end of the year so we can see what we have, if there’s any type of extra money or if we can move from one budget category to another.”

It’s a similar story at MOVAC.

“We’re going to be looking less at buying any new equipment. We have to cut in other areas to make up for that increase in gas prices,” Eisenhut said.

Pearl also said the gas is costly for volunteers as well, as many times they travel in their own vehicles to training and fires.