Rep. Tom Reed, R-Corning, is pictured speaking during a news conference recently.

U.S. Rep. Tom Reed says it is time for the federal government to become involved with the distribution of the COVID-19 vaccine in New York state.

During his conference call with area media on Wednesday morning, Reed urged the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the National Guard to oversee the vaccination process due to the many obstacles that the Empire State has faced since the rollout. He blames two major reasons for the bottleneck: an antiquated response system being used and an overload of of potential candidates who qualify for a treatment.

“I am the first Republican that came out last week and supported President Biden at least in New York, I am for full federalization of taking over New York’s distribution program because they have completely dropped the ball,” he said.

Reed, R-Corning, also took issue with state officials, including Gov. Andrew Cuomo for blaming the federal government for the delays in getting appointments set up. He said Cuomo is partially to blame when he allowed 7.5 million people who work as teachers, first-responders and other emergency personnel to become eligible for the vaccine.

In a sense, Reed said, he overloaded a system that is only providing about 250,000 vaccinations per week. On the state’s vaccination web site — https://am-i-eligible.covid19vaccine.health.ny.gov/ — there are no state-operated clinics in Southern Tier locations from Jamestown to Johnson City, which is outside Binghameton. The closest to Chautauqua County is the State University at Buffalo South Campus at Harriman Hall. As of Wednesday, there are no available appointments.