GEMS Awaiting OK to Move into King Street Facility

A year ago today, Super Storm Sandy ripped through Greenwich causing damage from the coastline to country clubs in backcountry Greenwich.

Among the casualties was the King Street outpost for Greenwich Emergency Medical Services. It wasn't as though the aging, decrepit former single family home was without its problems. But Sandy's winds and rain sounded the deathknell for the building on a lot adjacent to the town-owned Griffith Harris Golf Club, where town officials once hoped to build a fire and GEMS station to serve the Northwest corner of town.

The building was condemned and razed —after asbestos mitigation, and now the single-floor modular unit that will serve the King Street station for Greenwich Emergency Medical Service Medic 4 is in place ... and almost ready to go.

GEMS is waiting for the town's building department to issue a certificate of occupancy for the structure, according to Art Romano, GEMS deputy director. "it's completed and we’re waiting for the town to issue of CO so we can get back in there. As soon the town gives us the CO, we’lll be ready to move in the next day," Romano said.

According to Romano, the apparent hangup is engineering clearance of the wind speed the roof of the pre-fabricated structure can withstand. Romano referred questions on the clearance to Alan Monelli, the town's superintendent of facilities, who could not be reached for comment.

Until the certificate of occupancy is issued, Medic 4 remains headquartered at the Boys Scouts' Seton Reservation on Riversville Road. "Riversville has worked out well for us and the Boy Scouts have treated us very nicely," Romano said of the borrowed home base. "It hasn't impacted our response times."

The town established a round-the-clock assignment of an ambulance for the northwest sector in 2010, after eight years of daytime coverage with a crew for the area. The ambulance is staffed by a paramedic and emergency medical technician.

Meanwhile, the town is continuing to negotiations to purchase land in the John Street-Riversville Road area to create a fire and EMS station for the area, according to officials.