By LOHR McKINSTRY
Staff Writer
April 03, 2008 04:00 am
—
ELIZABETHTOWN -- Essex County lawmakers want all options for using a 911 grant exhausted before any of the money is spent on neighboring Hamilton County.
The $370,000 state 911 grant has $117,000 left and was due to expire Monday.
But the county got an extension to July 31 to spend the remaining funds, which County Enhanced-911 Coordinator Donald Jaquish requested for use on Pictometry three-dimensional aerial mapping of the Town of Long Lake in Hamilton County.
The new county 911 center in Lewis also dispatches emergency calls for Long Lake, and Pictometry mapping for Essex County was already done in 2005.
Jaquish said the grant money can be spent on dispatch consoles, voice-data loggers, satellite-location technology and advanced mapping.
"We have bought everything we need on the list. There are other things we have to buy, but we have to stick with the list."
Supervisor Joyce Morency (R-St. Armand) said she wanted the money spent in Essex County.
Jaquish said he asked the State 911 Board for permission to buy something not on the list and was denied.
Morency said that if the state turned them down, it should be put in writing.
"We do dispatching for Long Lake. It would be advanced mapping for them," Jaquish said.
He said the county is charging Long Lake $3,000 a year, plus a one-time fee of $8,000 for 911 addressing.
But County Attorney Daniel Manning III said Long Lake hasn't signed its contract yet.
"We don't have a contract with Long Lake. Things have been in flux. We want to be good neighbors. There has to be some sort of (financial) consideration."
The contract with Long Lake will be for only one year.
"We will have to increase their cost for next year," Jaquish said.
Verizon sent Essex County a bill for Long Lake for $13,000 to install control lines when Long Lake joined the 911 center.
"Essex County paid it," Supervisor George Canon (R-Newcomb) said. "They (Verizon) were threatening to turn it off."
Jaquish said Verizon gave the county a price quote for the lines, then included new charges for mileage, increasing the cost over what they'd agreed to pay.
Jaquish said he will check on buying spare dispatch consoles or more mapping for Essex County with the grant funds.
Long Lake officials have said their town will pay the 10-percent grant match if the Pictometry aerial photographs are taken there.
Supervisor Ronald Jackson (R-Essex) said that if they're going to lose the money he would rather "see it go to Long Lake than back to Albany."
Jaquish said he'll report back by next Monday's County Board of Supervisors meeting.
lmckinstry@pressrepublican.com
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