The Marshall County Jail employees will be working with a new phone system after action by the county commissioners Monday morning.
Marshall County 911 Director Matt Pitney told the commissioners that the phone number used by the public to call the sheriff’s department has been out since Dec. 7 and the staff could not make outgoing calls Monday morning.
“Initially, it was a power supply issue,” explained Pitney. “We had a power supply overnighted to us. The power supply came in and it was installed. When everything came back up, not everything came back up. We had no incoming on the 3187 and no voicemail. Every so often we’d publish the 9066 number for people to call and we found that every so often it would just lock up the system.”
Sheriff Matt Hassel expressed concern about the antiquated phone system years ago, but now the time has come to get a new system.
“Matt [Pitney] and [IT Director] Mike Marshall have been working with a company over the summer. They’ve already audited our building with how many phones we need. We’ve already done that research and everything. I think we need to move forward now to get the new system in as soon as possible.”
Pitney said the phones were ready to be installed as soon as the commissioners approved the paperwork. There will be more capabilities for easier access to voicemail and other benefits.
It was stressed that the 9-1-1 lines were not affected as they are a separate digital line to the sheriff’s department.
A monthly price was not shared during the meeting, but Pitney commented that it would be less than what they were paying the previous provider.
The commissioners unanimously approved a one year contract with Indiana Electronics that is set to begin on Jan. 1.
