Emergency Management System

The EMS committee made their recommendations for the FERC criteria Thursday night. They first explained that Reynolds County does not have a real 911 system. If I were to call 911 the call would be routed to an 800 number that would in turn call the Sheriffs office. So the dispatcher who answers the phone has no idea who or where I am and if another 911 call is made they will get a busy signal, since there is no dedicated line for this service. So the EMS committee is proposing that Reynolds and Iron Counties join St. Francois County for their e911 system.

Second it was proposed that a dedicated room be added to the court house to house the dispatcher and the other EMS equipment. The court house does not have a generator, so if power is lost they have a hard time responding to emergencies, so a generator is part of the EMS proposal.

The third part if the proposal is for the communication system that I talked about below. So tower(s) and new radios for all departments involved in the EMS.

The final part of the system is the new equipment, fire trucks, search and rescue equipment, ambulances, ect.

The total cost is between $1.8 million and $2.2 million depending on some variables. So if the panel goes with this proposal it will take about 40% of the $5 million. Some on the panel seemed to think this was a lot of $$$ for EMS, but I for one feel it is a great investment in "the quality of life" for everyone in the county, plus all the visitors we have here each summer.

It was interesting that the sheriff still made his proposal for 2 four wheel drive trucks for his office that were not part of this EMS proposal. I heard that many of the related departments that were left out of the plan were upset with this proposal.

A side note, if this plan is funded one of the things the county commissioners will have to do is assign 911 addresses. My address is RR 1 Box 16F and that won't work for e911. I bring this up because a year ago I wanted to open an account with Vanguard and was told that because of Homeland Security I could not open the account with my current address. I talked to my postmistress and found out that it is up to the county commission to assign addresses, not the post office. Anyway, as far as Vanguard knows I live at 16 Peola Road. Life is interesting in the country.