The Pulaski County Emergency Management Agency may soon once again have its own vehicle for use in emergency incidents. The EMA has reached an agreement to get its old pickup truck back from the Sheriff’s Department.
The Pulaski County EMA has been without its own vehicle since former EMA Director Larry Hoover resigned last summer. At that time, the truck was returned to the Sheriff’s Department due to a shortage of vehicles there, according to Sheriff Jeff Richwine. That left current EMA Director Sheri Gaillard without a vehicle to use for towing equipment and transporting supplies.
The County Council last week approved funding for a used truck for the EMA, but Sheriff Jeff Richwine says one council member had another solution in mind, “Councilman [Mike] Tiede came up to me and made the suggestion of giving the truck that we now have to EMA and then taking the $16,500 that they had appropriated for the EMA to find a used truck, and then find some money in my budget and buy the Sheriff’s Office a new truck, and I said I’d be willing to do that, as long as everybody else was.” Gaillard gave her approval, and the Sheriff’s Department also agreed to spend about $1,000 out of its budget to re-equip the truck with the proper lights and decals for EMA use.
Richwine says his department has purchased a new truck from a local dealer, and as soon as it’s ready, the existing truck will be given back to the EMA Department. He says this solution seems to work well for everyone involved. “The truck she needs that we have is a three-quarter ton truck so she can haul these heavier trailers that she has to haul,” he said. “The Sheriff’s Department doesn’t haul any of these big trailers, so we just needed a vehicle to replace that one, so we found one, and I think everybody’s happy.”
The arrangement is expected to be completed in the next few months.
