At the request of pickleball players, Castlegar will put a first aid kit in Millennium Park, but council doesn’t think it’s practical to place a defibrillator there as well.
Council discussed a request last week from Kere MacGregor and Carolyn MacKinnon on behalf of the local pickleball community.
They said one of their members recently broke a bone while playing the game. Another member who is a registered nurse treated the injury until the ambulance arrived.
However, they wrote that the incident has “rocked our community and got us discussing the lack of emergency equipment at such a busy recreation area.”
They asked for a first aid kit to be added to Millennium Park along with an automated external defibrillator.
“It’s only a matter of time before another medical event happens and we would like to know that the city has assessed the risks and provided ample emergency preparedness,” they said.
“One of our members had a cardiac incident at another facility a
couple of months ago so we know the threat is real.”
Councillors said they had no issue adding a first aid kit, but they felt the defibrillator posed a challenge, since they weren’t sure where and how it would be stored.
“I don’t think it’s something that cities normally put in parks,” councillor Darcy Bell said. “It’s just not logistically feasible.”
Other councillors agreed.
“Most things in Millennium are getting vandalized and we’re having to replace them or fix them, so I don’t know how we would have that [defibrillator] there, even if it was under lock and key,” said councillor Cherryl MacLeod.
