Quinn Blasts NYPD Over Slow Response to Heat Emergency

Article by C. Zawadi Morris

New York City Police Commissioner Ray Kelly got a personal phone call from an unhappy Christine Quinn after paramedics took more than 30 minutes to arrive to aid a City Council intern who collapsed during a press conference Tuesday, The Daily News reported. 

During a press conference that afternoon, an intern who works in the office of City Councilwoman Diana Reyna collapsed due to heat exhaustion. 

Even after calls to the fire and police commissioners, a Hatzolah ambulance still arrived at the Brooklyn scene before EMS. Quinn phoned Kelly and called the whole thing “inexcusable.”

Fire officials and sources said there was an extremely high volume of emergency calls in the area — many of them heat-related — and there wasn’t an ambulance immediately available. However, EMS communications logs show the calls were classified as low “level five” priority.

“If Speaker Quinn had not been at that site, that young lady would have waited an hour or two for an ambulance,” said Israel Miranda, president of the union of paramedics and emergency medical technicians. 

“We’ve been saying the city needs more paramedics and ambulances to serve the public.”