Village, MVAC at odds over headquarters rent

The Malverne Volunteer Ambulance Corps is one month closer to having its own headquarters in the village.

Part of the Department of Public Works facility — the one-rig garage that housed one VAC ambulance — was demolished just prior to Thanksgiving Day and basic foundation work on the new building began shortly thereafter.

While excited about the prospect of finally having a headquarters, Corps members are concerned about the financial undertaking that accompanies the new home. According to VAC President Joe Karam, the corps is expected to pay $24,000 a year in rent — an amount that far exceeds what the organization can raise.

“There’s no way in hell we can afford twenty-four thousand a year, no way in hell. There’s no way we could do it,” Karam recently told the Herald. “It’s insane and it’s just going to put the ambulance corps under. … Plus, they want us to pay for utilities and gas for the building, so that’s a big issue now. So this building that they’re building us is great — there’s no way the ambulance corps can afford it. They’re doing it because elections are coming up in March. That’s all this is, to make them look good.”

Malverne Mayor Patricia McDonald said the rent has not yet been determined and that the village board is discussing the issue with the corps.

“We don’t want to do anything to hurt the ambulance corps,” she said. “That’s the whole reason for the building — we know how important the ambulance corps is to the village and to the residents of the community. We have to sit down with them and we have to figure out what we’re going to do.”

The VAC will pay the village $150,000 up front to build the $700,000 facility, Karam said, noting that should cover about seven years’ rent. The village will contribute $500,000, and $60,000 will come from funds secured by County Legislature Francis Becker (R-Lynbrook).

The corps’ share of the funding was generated entirely by donations — donations that took some 20 or 30 years to collect, according to Karam. The VAC holds a $59,500 contract for services to the village, and most of that money goes to liability and insurance for the ambulances, Karam said, adding that corps members pay out of pocket for medical supplies, drugs and other materials and equipment. They will also pay nearly $25,000 — which they raised from donations over the last two years — to furnish the new facility.

If it were up to the VAC and some of its supporters, the corps would pay $1 a year in rent. “A lot of residents are in uproar when they started hearing about this. They’re not happy about it, let’s put it that way,” Karam said, adding that he believes the village might come around once residents start speaking up on the VAC’s behalf.

McDonald would not comment on the VAC’s $1-a-year proposal. “It has to be a board decision,” she said.

“I think it’s disgusting that the village wants to charge them any rent when it’s a volunteer, not-for-profit organization,” said Malverne resident Edith Heinsohn, an avid VAC supporter. “If they’re going to charge them rent, it should be a decent amount — certainly not twenty-four thousands dollars a year. That’s ridiculous. They should come to some sort of a middle agreement, something that the ambulance corps can afford that’s not going to jeopardize the way that they run.”

Heinsohn, a proponent of the $1-a-year rent plan, said she was particularly incensed that the village expects the organization to use its primary funding — donations — to pay what she considers exorbitant rent. “My donations are going to rent and I’m not donating to pay rent,” she said, “I’m donating for life-saving equipment, I’m donating for things that they need to help people.”

When told the village must charge some form of rent because the VAC is not a government-owned entity, Heinsohn said there are other ways to handle the matter. “I don’t know what the solution is,” she said, “but there should be some sort of an amount — make it a hundred dollars a month — the bare minimum.”

The new facility, which will sit alongside the soon-to-be-renovated DPW facility on Hempstead Avenue, will have two bays, one for each ambulance, a basement, a ground floor, a meeting room, bathrooms and showers. It was originally scheduled to be completed in the spring, but weather and other factors could push completion into the summer, according to Karam.

When the project was first unveiled in August, Malverne Deputy Mayor James Callahan III said the driving force behind it was the corps’ need for more volunteers, particularly between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m., from both in and outside the village. Callahan had said the plan was chosen after much consideration as it was the most affordable and convenient: Because the village already owns the property, there would be no affect on the village’s tax rolls and it would “kill two birds with one stone” by providing the corps with a headquarters and simultaneously renovating the existing DPW facility.