Ruthie Braunstein/The Hoya GU Hospital President Joy Drass (left), and a hopsital representative (right), updated the BZA about the neighbors concerns

Georgetown Emergency Response Medical Service representatives answered complaints at the Board of Zoning and Adjustment meeting Thursdayof Burleith residents regarding hazardous GERMS vehicles parked on 37th Street.

At the BZA’s quarterly meeting, Burleith resident Bonnie Hardy said GERMS drivers who live off campus regularly park the oversized vehicles illegally, potentially obstructing a driver’s view and taking up more than one parking space. She said the drivers often return home repeatedly during the day and park their vehicles in hazardous locations.

“The neighborhood would like it if the GERMS drivers lived on campus,” Hardy said. “I think [GERMS] is a wonderful program but they are community vehicles that should not be stationed on city streets.”

“You are greatly increasing the possibility of accidents,” Peter Pulsifer, the former chairman of the 2E Advisory Neighborhood Commission, which oversees Georgetown, said.

GERMS, a non-profit student-run service, provides basic life support services to the university’s main campus and the surrounding community. All GERMS members are undergraduate volunteers certified by the District of Columbia.

GERMS President Rich Sharpe (COL ’02) said he acknowledged the validity of the residents safety concerns, but did not agree with Hardy’s proposal of enacting an on-campus housing restriction.

“[GERMS] is an all-student volunteer group and some of them are going to have to live off campus,” Sharpe said. He added that the organization presently consists of 65 undergraduates who possess academic and extracurricular commitments outside of their volunteer job with GERMS. Sharpe said he did not think it would be fair to ask the volunteers to abstain from returning to their homes during the weekday.

“[Enacting on-campus housing restrictions] would reduce the number of students interested in the position,” Carol Day, adviser to GERMS, said. “We would handicap GERMS were we to place these restrictions on them.”

Sharpe stressed the usefulness of GERMS, emphasizing its benefit not only to the university but also to the surrounding community.

According to Sharpe, GERMS treats at least 650 patients per year and although non-students do not regularly utilize the service, it is open to residents of the surrounding community. If GERMS were to enact housing or parking restrictions, Sharpe said, the residents would also feel the effects of the reduced number of volunteers. The Department of Public Safety and the Metropolitan Police Department would have to respond to cases that student volunteers would have otherwise, causing backup and inefficient response services.

At Thursday’s meeting Manager of the Southwest Quadrangle Project Carl Mayfield also presented an update, saying that excavation of the construction site will hopefully be completed in early summer. He said 87 percent of the excavation is complete and that 13 percent of the entire construction is finished.

“Noise levels have reduced significantly . to 75-80 decibels,” Mayfield said. “Now that the dirt is out of the whole, truck driving has decreased,” he added.