The Marshall County Commissioners support the purchase of new radios and 911 consoles for the Marshall County Jail.
Sheriff Matt Hassel explained to the commissioners Tuesday morning that the current radio consoles desperately need an upgrade.
“For those that have some technology knowledge, the consoles themselves are still on the operating system of XP,” explained Sheriff Hassel. “We had a system go down here about a year-and-a-half ago and we had to make an emergency run to Fort Wayne just to find another machine that could replace it. Basically, XP is end of life and everybody is now at system 10 for the operating system.”
Hassel said Emergency Radio Service is the vendor who the county has worked with for past equipment and their quote was $518,790 to upgrade four consoles. The price also includes new 800 MHz Motorola radios. An additional $102,904 would be included for a five-year maintenance agreement.
Marshall County Sheriff’s Department 911/Communcations Director Matt Pitney said he recommends the additional expense of $84,511 for a remote system just in case of an emergency.
Pitney stated, “My recommendation is that it would be in Clyde’s [Avery, Marshall County EMA Director] office where we have our CAD system, we have the 911 backup phone. We could send somebody over to run this. One of the other things that we’ve looked at is obviously, anytime that we would have an issue where something might happen at the jail where we would have to evacuate, or have a catastrophic failure of some sort, this would be a back-up for us.”
Sheriff Hassel said the Bremen Police Department would act as a back-up, in case the back-up system is not purchased.
Three consoles would be paid for out of the LIT Special Purpose Fund and one out of the Central Dispatch Fund. Funding for the remote console would need to be determined.
Pitney noted that UPS updates will be done soon and the radios will need to be down for about 5 to 10 minutes during that process where communications will need to be covered by other means during that time.
Once the funding it approved, it could take up to a year before it is installed.
Because it is a specialized purchase and it is compatible with the current equipment, the bidding process should not be needed.
In a separate request, Sheriff Hassel asked the commissioners to upgrade the video system in the jail as it is at end of life. The cost is $252,765 to come out of the LIT Special Purpose Fund.
The commissioners supported both purchases with a unanimous vote. The request will now go before the Marshall County Council who will consider funding the upgrades.
