Class Of 2022 Celebrates Its Challenges & Victories

By Jeremy Van Duyne

MILFORD — This past Friday night the senior class at Delaware Valley High School officially graduated from high school, bringing an end to their grade school experience. The Class of 2022 received their High School diplomas one by one and threw their caps in the air to celebrate their transition to adulthood.
Much like graduation ceremonies held during the past two years, there was a theme present about the struggles during the COVID-19 pandemic and the new challenges that students have had to navigate around due to it. Salutatorian Ajay Byadgi opened up his speech by congratulating his classmates about how they managed to get through these last few years.
Byadgi said that the obstacles they faced only made graduating much more of an accomplishment. He also took time in his speech to thank all the parents but also the faculty and staff who have helped shape the students over the years into becoming who they are today.
“I know that you have probably heard this a lot,” said Byadgi as he opened his speech. “But these last few years have been unusually challenging. And they have forced many of you to adapt and grow.
“However, the added struggle has made graduating even more of an accomplishment to be proud of.”............................For more information subscribe to our paper.

County Spending On EMS Showing Results

By Chris Jones

MILFORD — Pike County’s anteing up $2 million to support local ambulance corps has resulted in more stations responding to calls with better-trained staff that get there faster.
“These are life-saving numbers,” Pike County Commissioner Chairman Matt Osterberg said last week after hearing County Emergency Management Director Tim Knapp outline his findings on changes in Basic Life Support (BLS) and Advanced Life Support (ALS) performance from 2017 to 2022.
“This shows how much the county coming on board changed everything,” Knapp said. Before the county agreed to match up to 2 mills of municipal financial support for local ambulance services, there were chronic problems of staffing, equipment, and poor response times, with individual EMS squads bickering over being spread too thin and answering more calls in neighboring towns than in their own backyard.
The result was long delays in responding to critical health emergencies, often without ALS support, which marshals personnel with higher skills and the ability to administer medicines.
Knapp gave several examples of how individual squads cut their response times: Shohola went from an average of 27 minutes in 2017 to 8.25 minutes in 2022; Dingman Township went from 18.9 minutes to 11.8.
“The reason is that with more money we can get more paid staff, with pretty good wages now,” Knapp said. Paid EMT’s are in the building during key hours. Volunteers can’t respond as fast. Knapp said paid EMS personnel are the wave of the future.............................For more information subscribe to our paper.

Council Backs Bill Allowing Radar’s Use By Local Police

By Jeremy Van Duyne

MILFORD — At Monday night’s Milford Borough Council meeting the council voted to send a letter of support to local state legislators for Pennsylvania House Bill 606.
House Bill 606 addresses the use of radar by municipal police. Pennsylvania is the only state in the country that prohibits police from a municipality to use radar to check for speeding. Currently only state police are allowed to do so under Pennsylvania law. One of the groups advocating for the bill is the Pennsylvania Municipal League, an advocacy group of behalf of Pennsylvania local governments.
“Radar is acknowledged by law enforcement personnel as the safest, most accurate and efficient speed timing device,” read the website for the league. “Despite this fact, Pennsylvania is the only state in the country that does not allow for the local use of radar. As a result, speeding on neighborhood roads is consistently the most common concern voiced by our constituents.”
According to Milford Police Chief Matt McCormack, allowing the use of radar for municipal police departments such as Milford would have tremendous impact on the police catching speeders. The tool would allow them to have a time advantage over speeding vehicles, leading to less chaos when police have to go after a vehicle that is speeding.
“With a radar gun I have you before you see me,” said McCormack at the meeting. “I am already coming out to get you. I am not chasing you. You aren’t seven blocks ahead of me. I am not going to have to accelerate and cause trouble.”
Currently Milford Police use a timing device to gauge speed over a fixed distance. The object vehicle has to pass the police car before the speed can be determined.............................For more information subscribe to our paper.