Air ambulance company REVA will establish an operations center at the Schenectady County Airport, bringing 12 full-time and 50 part-time jobs to Glenville, New York.
The company is based in Florida and uses aircraft to transport patients in need of critical medical treatment. It will lease half of Richmor Aviation’s new 20,000-square-foot hangar for its own office and hangar space, beginning Dec. 1. It plans to base two Learjet 35 aircraft at the airport.
The 12 full-time jobs will be made up of a combination of captains, co-pilots, and one nurse. The 50 part-time jobs will be for registered flight nurses, paramedics, respiratory therapists and physicians. REVA plans to hire locally for the positions.
REVA, which has more than 300 employees nationally, is opening the new operations center in order to better serve its Northeast customers, REVA chief financial officer Michael Labinski said.
The center will serve as a base from which the company can send out planes to pick up and drop off patients. It has similar facilities in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, San Juan, Puerto Rico, and Phoenix. It considered New Jersey, Pennsylvania and other New York cities in its search for a location for the new center, Labinski said.
“This company could have gone anywhere [in the Northeast] with a 5,000-foot runway. This is a very competitive situation,” said Ray Gillen, chair of the Schenectady Metroplex Development Authority, which is providing a $36,000 grant to help with project costs. Of that grant, $31,500 will go to REVA to cover about a third of its setup and moving costs. The remaining $4,500 will go to Richmor Aviation to pay for part of a $30,000 renovation to the hangar, which will also add the office space REVA needs.
REVA chose Schenectady because of the services that Richmor Aviation offered, Labinski said.
“A heavy portion of our decision was based on our maintenance partner … and Richmor had great Learjet experience,” Labinski said.
REVA also plans to work with Schenectady County Community College’s aviation, air traffic controller and health care programs. The company takes on interns from local colleges annually and hires them after graduation if there are openings.
http://www.bizjournals.com/albany/news/2015/11/05/air-ambulance-company-brings-62-jobs-to.html