Dennysville ambulance service in critical need of volunteers

A public emergency meeting will be held on Thursday, March 16, at 6 p.m. at the Edmunds Consolidated School regarding the Dennysville Volunteer Ambulance Service, according to Wayne Seeley, captain of the ambulance service. The ambulance is in desperate need of EMTs in order to continue providing service to the residents of its service area of Dennysville, Edmunds Township, Marion Township, Cathance Township and Pembroke. The meeting will focus on discussion about this important matter, and solutions will be considered. Anyone who cannot attend the meeting but is interested can call Seeley at 726-4674.
To help address the shortage of ambulance personnel, an EMT course will be offered at Washington County Community College in Calais beginning early in April. This course will be partly in-person at the college and partly online, and its length will encompass 150 hours of work. More information about this course will be available at the March 16 meeting.
The Dennysville Volunteer Ambulance has been in business for almost 60 years, beginning with an ambulance donated by the Mahar family members who were raised in Dennysville and who later moved to New Jersey. Wayne and Roberta Seeley have worked on the ambulance for most of those years and would like to see younger people step up and prepare to do the work for the ambulance service. Without new volunteers, this service will no longer be offered to the public.
This volunteer ambulance is one of only two or three volunteer ambulance services in the state of Maine. All others in the state are staffed by paid personnel and are better able to recruit new workers.
Adults of any age are welcome to become part of this service, but young people especially are encouraged and urged to attend the March 16 meeting and consider volunteering. One does not need to be a resident of one of the served towns in order to volunteer.