The approval for the Newton County Sherriff’s Office to apply for a new grant was among the items voted on at the Newton County Board of Supervisors meeting on March 18.
With a unanimous vote, the NCSO will be able to apply for a new JAG grant.
Sherriff Joedy Pennington said that if they were to receive the grant, the 25% matching funds would be waived so they would not be responsible paying it. So, if they were to receive the grant, it would be the whole $5,000.
Pennington also requested that the board bid for some construction on a maintenance building at the NCSO.
The board voted to approve the open bidding, so they will be advertising over the next couple of weeks with bidding opening on May 3, 2021.
Fire Department Coordinator Brian Taylor was at the meeting to give the board an update on the new radios the fire departments in Newton County received. Taylor said he has received the rest of the checks from the allocated money each department had to spend on the radios and pagers.
He also informed the board that there are currently two of the trucks down; Greenfield’s and Union’s. Both will be repaired once the needed part is delivered.
To finish out his update, Taylor said that the dispatch’s computer-based consoles for the radios will need to be updated in 2022.
To close out the board meeting, the board members discussed the tornado sirens that are currently located on East Central Community College’s campus. There has been a dispute as to who actually owns the sirens due to them being on ECCC’s campus. Due to it no longer functioning, the question of who will pay to fix it. It was concluded that board attorney Jason Mangum will look back at a previous board meeting’s minutes to see if it is clearly defined whether or not the county owns the sirens.
