911 Board Discusses Purchasing Subscriber Units
Oskaloosa, Iowa – The Mahaska County E911 Board met on Thursday evening where they discussed the recent Mahaska County Supervisors meeting, at which Rey Freeman presented his recommendation that the Board of Supervisors accept RACOM’s bid for a new emergency radio system.
The discussion at that meeting was how each different entity that would use the system would pay for their own radios.
The 911 board talked about utilizing 911 phone surcharge funds to help pay for those new radios that would be utilized by first responders themselves. These would be the portable and mobile radios used by first responders at an incident.
The total cost for the portable and mobile radios or “subscriber units” along with the 911 side would be just over 1 million dollars.
That would include 200 portable radios and 65 mobile radios, along with a base unit.
Mahaska County Supervisor Mark Groenendyk said that the supervisors have given the public 2 weeks since that meeting with Rey Freeman to give public comments on the RACOM proposal. Groenendyk said he’s received no comments from the public in regards to the proposal by RACOM.
The Mahaska County E911 Board voted to approve the purchase of the radios from 911 surcharge money, pending the contract with the Mahaska County Board of Supervisors.
The board approved updating the mobile communications trailer with antennas for local communication during emergencies.
The board selected a new chairman, Russ Van Renterghem, and vice chairman, Tom Walling.