Hurley Ambulance Service, a 24-hour paid operation rolled out in November after months of delays to augment volunteers, has cut emergency response times to under three minutes, according to service President Mathew Sirni.

“It was not at all uncommon that people were waiting 15 minutes, 20 minutes, just to find out that there was an ambulance finally responding,” Sirni said at Wednesday’s town meeting.

The independent nonprofit service, funded through a tax district that encompasses all of Hurley, employs about two dozen paid staffers and responded to more than 300 calls in 2026, Sirni said. It bolsters first responders from volunteer firehouses in Hurley and West Hurley, both of which are suffering from a nationwide dearth of members.

It was expected to begin in March of 2025, only to be delayed by operational issues such as insurance and billing, Town Supervisor Michael Boms told the Daily Freeman in December.

Prior to November, ambulance responses were often mutual aid deployed from  neighboring towns such as Kingston, Marbletown, Olive and Woodstock.

“We had ambulances respond from Ellenville and Poughkeepsie,” each about 40 minutes from Hurley, Sirni said.

The paid service, which operates seven days a week, is more efficient because it doesn’t face the sort of delays often found at volunteer firehouses whose members have to make their way to the station from work or home, sometimes in the middle of the night, in order to respond, according to Hurley Ambulance Chief Leane Buchinger.

Hurley Ambulance is working to build a second ambulance team to cover for times when the first one is out on a job, Sirni said.

“It is still a learning process,” Sirni said. “This is a great improvement.”

Kyle Bredberg is an intern and contributing reporter. You can reach him at kyle@theoverlooknews.com.