For over a year, Newton County has been working to renovate and improve its emergency dispatching systems and consolidate 911 dispatching into one county-wide system. The main reasons cited for this move have been to cut costs and keep the crucial emergency call services local to the county rather than contract with another county or business to provide the service.
Efforts began in February 2018, when the county Board of Supervisors agreed to spend $428,000 to purchase a new Motorola dispatching system from Jackson Communications, and the county continues to make progress with the dispatching overhaul.
Last fall, E911 Director Brian Taylor approached the cities of Union and Newton with a proposal to roll their police dispatching into the county’s new system for a fee of $12 per person per year – about $48,000 for Newton and $24,000 for Union.
A few months later, Taylor also began talks with Hickory, Decatur and East Central Community College about consolidating their police dispatching in the county’s system as well. Fees for those municipalities were also based on a $12 per person per year rate, except for ECCC, which used a $9 per person per year rate. Taylor explained the difference was due to ECCC only having students on campus nine months out of the year.
As Taylor previously explained, all the proposals were for police dispatching only. The county is already handling the dispatching for all the fire departments throughout the county.
After weighing the pros and cons of the plan, mainly a $40,000 savings in dispatching costs, the City of Newton agreed to move forward with the consolidation, which is set to go live April 1. With Newton switching over, here is a look at where dispatching stands in Newton County.
Newton County
Consolidating all of Newton County’s dispatching services into one system is complicated, and the Board of Supervisors has run into several bumps in the road along the way.
In December, Taylor announced absorbing the City of Newton’s police dispatching would require spending an addition $12,000-$14,000 to purchase equipment and software to handle the additional call volume.
Additionally, the installation of the new 911 call center purchased in February 2018 is not complete. At the request of Taylor, the county is withholding the last payment of $180,000 to Motorola Solutions until the system is fully online.
Union
Although it would save the city roughly $76,000 per year and is supported by Mayor Wayne Welch, the City of Union has not signed on to the county’s plan to create a county-wide dispatching system.
Currently, 911 calls in Union are answered by Newton County dispatchers, then transferred to a Union dispatcher who relays the information to officers.
Hickory
In February, Hickory Police Chief Mark Spence attended the Board of Supervisors meeting to ask if the proposed cost of dispatching, about $6,000, could be revised. The Town of Hickory just doesn’t have the money, he explained, and the cost of dispatching would most likely result in Hickory’s Police Department closing permanently.
“We’re really struggling just to keep above water,” Spence told the board. “I’m just asking you to help us out.”
The board agreed to revisit the dispatching proposal to see if the fee could be reduced.
“We’re not trying to cripple anybody,” Supervisor Charles Moulds said.
Decatur
Although Taylor has reportedly begun talks with the Town of Decatur, no new developments have been announced on the issue of dispatching. However, Decatur’s dispatching service is unique to the county in that it is already handled entirely by the county.
Previously, the county has not charged for the service, but the board agreed in February it would be unfair to the rest of the county to continue dispatching for free.
East Central Community College
ECCC has put up the least amount of resistance to the county’s plan. In a Board of Supervisors meeting last Tuesday, Billy Stewart, president of ECCC, told the board the college was grateful for the partnership and did not see the proposal as being a big issue.
“It seems fair to ask us to pay for some of the services we’re using,” he said.
Of course, Stewart said, the proposal would need to be approved by the college Board of Trustees but added he did think it would be a contested issue.
The county is currently finalizing the proposal with East Central, which, if approved, is slated to go into effect July 1.
As consolidation efforts continue, Newton County supervisors have not yet set a plan for what to do if one or more municipalities refuse to accept their proposal. The board briefly touched on the subject in January, stating municipalities could either join on or find their own dispatching service, but no deadline to accept the county’s proposal has been set.
Should all municipalities, Union, Newton, Hickory, Decatur and East Central, agree to the proposal, the county would end up collecting an additional $90,000 - $100,000 in revenue each year.
