Park Forest, IL-(ENEWSPF)- The Park Forest Fire and Police Departments are observing CDC guidelines as they prepare for a first responder possibly contracting COVID-19. Both Fire Chief Tracy Natyshok and Police Chief Christopher Mannino said their respective departments are prepared in case the novel coronavirus comes to Park Forest.
Both chiefs said Park Forest currently has no known cases of COVID-19 among Village staff or residents.
But they’re preparing for the worst.
Police Chief Chris Mannino said his department has planned for the possibility of the disease arriving at the station, “Plans are in place should a first responder contract COVID-19 and are per CDC guidelines. At this time we have no known COVID-19 cases among any staff or residents in Park Forest.”
“We don’t have anyone here that’s sick,” Fire Chief Natyshok told eNews Park Forest. “We haven’t had a report of us transporting anyone that was sick yet either.”
“We are taking precautions per CDC. We’re looking at doing some shift maneuvers to try to limit any downtime to operations,” the chief said.
“Other than that, we’re just normal right now,” Chief Natyshok said, adding, “Knock on wood. I hate to say that word.”
Fire and Police personnel are reticent to relax when things quiet down. There is no “normal,” per se.
Chief Natyshok said he spoke with a friend out east in an area that has roughly three-times the population density of Park Forest, “He said that they’re getting hit real hard right now. He said to expect that we’re about a week or two behind them. I’m hoping we’ll have a little more success with social spacing.”
“We’ll see,” Chief Natyshok said.
