Private ambulance company says its future depends on business

CHENANGO COUNTY – If business is good, they’ll stay. If it’s bad, they’ll leave.

That’s the approach Cooperstown Medical Transport (CMT) will have to take when it partially replaces Superior Ambulance, a representative of the new service said.

“We’ll see. If the work is there, it merits us doing business,” said CMT’s Chief Financial Officer, Margaret McGown. “If there isn’t work, we’ll be in the same boat as Superior.”

No official start date for CMT has been set.

The company is still awaiting state approval, but plans to bring in one ambulance to offset the loss of Superior, which pulled its last emergency vehicle out of the county at 5 a.m. this morning.

Superior, a private emergency squad, had previously handled around 2,000 calls per year in Chenango County. It already cut back its ambulances from three to one in January, citing a lack of profitable 911 calls.

CMT doesn’t have all the details of the new venture hammered out yet, McGown said, but expects to sure up its role in Chenango County in the coming months.

“We’re still learning as we go,” she said. “We haven’t been planning this that long. So there’s going to have to be a lot of figuring over the next few months.”

Right now, McGown says the company plans to start with one ambulance that will come from either Oneonta or Sidney, but admits the starting locations and the number of vehicles could change.

Before that can happen, CMT is soliciting over 60 letters from local leaders and emergency officials that affirm their is a serious need for their ambulance service in the county – a state requirement.

“We’ll see how it goes from there,” she said. “So far we are very encouraged based on what people there have told us.”