We spent years documenting problems and attempted solutions with the Voorheesville Area Ambulance Service. As with many organizations staffed with volunteers, the pool of people willing and able to make such a sacrifice is drying up.

Part of this is because many families now have two wage-earners — no longer is it the norm for a wife to tend to the children while her husband works or volunteers as a first responder. Part of it, too, is more and more hours of training are required for first responders. To become an emergency medical technician takes 140 hours of training; to become a paramedic takes 1,400.

Another part of the problem is the population of suburban towns like New Scotland and Guilderland is growing — so there are more people to tend to. The crews who save lives are busier.

Then, too, there is something less concrete but just as important — a disintegration in our sense of community. Fewer people feel compelled to serve, to volunteer their time and talents.

The slow and painful death of the Voorheesville Area Ambulance Service was public. We covered the way the volunteers tried a private service and how that turned out to be a disappointment. We covered the talks members of the service had with the town, the village, and the Albany County Sheriff’s Department. Ultimately, we covered how the county services prevailed and the last of the remaining volunteers combined forces with a squad in a neighboring town.

Similarly, in the Helderberg Hilltowns, we’ve covered the steady inroads the county has made in emergency services, starting years ago with a shared fly car to provide paramedic services, and now the replacement of the volunteer squad in Rensselaerville by county employees. Berne still has a volunteer squad, which serves Berne and part of Knox. The other part of Knox is serviced by the Altamont Rescue Squad.

Every step of this coverage — right down to when each squad went to revenue recovery from insurance companies — has been documented for the public. Government leaders and leaders of volunteers alike were open about their problems and the solutions they thought would work best. Even when factions disagreed, the public could be informed about both sides. There were no surprises.

The big surprise came in Guilderland last week. In a single meeting — without any previous public discussion — the town board unanimously agreed to set up and staff its own ambulance service as well as to purchase an ambulance for severely obese patients to be shared with the county.

Months ago, our newsroom had been alerted that changes were afoot but when our Guilderland reporter, Elizabeth Floyd Mair, called town Supervisor Peter Barber and Captain Daniel McNally, who currently oversees Guilderland Emergency Medical Services, a division of the Guilderland Police Department, they told her the rumors were unfounded.

Leaders of the Western Turnpike Rescue Squad said last week that they were caught by surprise, too. Guilderland had long been served by two squads made up of volunteers — Western Turnpike and Altamont — supplying basic life support services. In 1986, the town increased its care with seven police paramedics, supplying advanced life support. As the paramedics became overworked combining rescue work with police work, emergency medical service work became a full-time job. Guilderland EMS currently has 15 full-time and five part-time paramedics.

Western Turnpike has become a fully paid service while Altamont has 18 paid workers along with 12 volunteers who work side by side.

Alan Fitzpatrick, president of the Western Turnpike Rescue Squad, believes that the town’s setting up its own service with its bariatric ambulance is the beginning of the end for Western Turnpike. He foresees the Altamont and Western Turnpike squads folding “and everything working under one umbrella out of town hall, and having to hire a lot of people.”

McNally responded to Fitzpatrick’s concern, through The Enterprise, by saying the town is trying to be proactive at a time when ambulance services statewide are having a hard time surviving. He asked, hypothetically, what would happen if one morning Western Turnpike’s doors were suddenly closed — the town would be left scrambling to start an ambulance service.

We have no way of knowing if either man’s vision is accurate. We also have no way of knowing what is best for the town because its leaders have not been open.

We do know that keeping the public in the dark is not the best way to proceed. We agree with what Benjamin Weaver, a member of the Western Turnpike Board, had to say: “You need a full plan, especially when you’re talking about the health and safety of the residents.”

Floyd Mair’s story this week makes it clear there has been a delay in response time from midnight to 6 a.m. That’s important for the public to know. It’s also commendable that the town sought to solve the problem. Response time can make the difference between life and death.

But the town should let its residents know what its long-range plan is. It should also provide the public — as well as the members of the current squads serving the town — with the specifics of how many workers will be hired to staff the new ambulance, with what qualifications, for what shifts, and at what pay and benefits.

Fitzpatrick, who is a taxpayer in town, says that his taxes for ambulance service have hardly increased  in the last 20 years while fire-department taxes have gone up “significantly.” His sense is that government spending is unchecked.

The public deserves an analysis of how costs compare between the current ambulance services in town and the new town-run service. Of course, this should have been done in advance of the town board’s unanimous vote that set the new system in motion without any public input.

But it’s not too late to restore public confidence by sharing both the numbers and the reasoning, as well as projections for the future. After all, it’s the public that is paying for the system and that will be served by it.