County to Partner with 911 on more affordable Emergency Radio Communications Package (View Video Here)

January 23, 2024
By: Dwayne Page

It’s not a $2.3 million solution to the overall problem, but the county and 911 Director have found common ground on a way to fund a portion of the county’s emergency radio communication system needs.

During Monday night’s monthly meeting, the County Commission voted unanimously (among the 12 commissioners in attendance) to adopt a proposal offered by 911 Director Brad Mullinax and County Mayor Matt Adcock to make a one- time expenditure of $1.2 million in a joint venture with the 911 board to replace all radios for the sheriff’s department and ambulance service through Motorola Solutions, except for the EMS mobile radios the state is going to fund. The Motorola radios would be under warranty for seven years. To keep the costs down, new radios for the county fire department and rescue squad would not be included in this plan. Efforts would be made to apply for federal funding through FEMA’s Assistance to Fighters Grant for new fire department radios only. However, there is no guarantee the county’s AFG grant application would be funded. If not, the county would have to come up with a plan to incrementally fund the purchase of new fire department and rescue squad radios. In the meantime, both the fire department and rescue squad could continue to use the radios they have.

Although the 911 Board has not yet met to sign on to this latest proposal, Director Mullinax said he will ask the board to authorize funding for half the project, $600,000 if the county will agree to fund the other half, $600,000. According to County Mayor Adcock, the county’s portion would come from a combined total of $297,581 in federal American Rescue Plan Tribal funds and unrestricted opioid settlement money along with an appropriation from the county general budget’s unassigned fund balance (reserves or local tax dollars) of $302,418 through a budget amendment to be considered at the February commission meeting . Under this plan, the county would enter into a $1.2 million contract with Motorola to purchase the radios and the 911 board would pay their part ($600,000) directly to the county as a contribution.

Unlike the previous proposals offered over the last month including the latest by 911 on Friday, this plan requires no lease or financing. It’s a one-time expenditure. But while this proposal is cheaper than the others previously offered, Director Mullinax said it does not address all the county’s communication issues.

“The 911 board voted unanimously on Friday during an emergency session to make a $900,000 contribution to the county to replace the entire radio system. This was a $2.3 million project. But after a discussion with County Mayor Matt Adcock, I don’t think that plan would be financially feasible for the county. While that is the ideal solution to replace all the public safety radios, the county is probably not in a financial position to do that right now based on some of the concerns Mayor Adcock expressed to me,” said Mullinax.

“This new deal is for $1.2 million. I have not yet talked to all of my 911 board members. As part of this deal we (911) don’t get the free consoles from Motorola so we (911) will have to buy our consoles at $300,000. So instead of offering the county $900,000 I am still willing to put in the $600,000 to the county which would make the county’s portion a $600,000 investment with no lease agreement or financing to burden the taxpayer. Although it is not the best solution, I think this is a very good option,” said Mullinax.

“What this current $1.2 million proposal would do is replace all the radios for law enforcement and EMS”, Mullinax explained. “ As you know the state of Tennessee is putting mobile radios in ambulances at no charge. That is part of the Tennessee Department of Health Initiative so all we need to do for the EMS is put portable radios and vehicle repeaters in the ambulances so they can use those portable radios. That would complete that piece of it. For law enforcement we would be putting in mobile radios, vehicle repeaters, and portables. Our law enforcement and EMS personnel are the ones that use the system the most so I think it’s a priority to get those replaced first but we don’t want to leave out our rescue squad and fire department. Their radios will need to be replaced eventually. Another benefit of this deal is that I can take the two repeaters on Short Mountain that are still functioning for EMS and law enforcement and disconnect them and put them in my office and if we have an outage on the fire channel (frequency), I have some backup parts I can use to replace that until the portable and mobile radios can be replaced for the fire department,” added Mullinax.

“As I have told you in the past, the main problem with the radio system is not necessarily the radios in the cars, but it’s the repeater equipment, the microwave equipment on Short Mountain, Snow Hill, and Jefferson that connect all that together and make it work. That is the problem,” explained Mullinax. “ As we speak and ever since the ice storm and snow of last week, the Snow Hill and Jefferson sites have been off line. They are still not working at all. We are working off the Short Mountain site alone. We have had lots of discussions about going to the Tennessee Advanced Communications Network (TACN) network. A system maintained by the State of Tennessee which is responsible for all repairs, maintenance, and upgrades. But in order to join TACN, responder radio replacements here are required. Over the long haul, there is no doubt in my mind that by joining TACN we would save us a lot of money for maintenance and upkeep of those radios,” said 911 Director Mullinax.

Where does that leave the county fire department?

“It is AFG enrollment time,” said Mullinax. “I have talked to Fire Chief Donny Green and there is a very good chance that the county fire department could get a grant to replace their radios. It might be strengthened a little bit by this deal we are offering you because the fire department will have a problem with interoperability inside this county. If we switch the TACN system over to digital for law enforcement and EMS, (the county fire department) is going to have to be patched through dispatch in order for it to work but it will work just fine. If they (firefighters) are on a scene working, we can do a radio patch and they will never know the difference,” said Mullinax.

Fire Chief Green said he supports the plan to incrementally integrate new radios into all the county emergency service agencies, but he doesn’t want the fire department to be left out long term if an AFG grant application is not funded for this purpose.

“The Assistance to Firefighters Grant is a federal program administered by FEMA and there are three categories and one is to apply as a single fire department, which is what we have done in the past,” said Chief Green. “The other is for health and safety type things, and the last is a regional grant option and with that you partner with other agencies and departments. The only agencies that are eligible to receive benefits under the Assistance to Firefighter Grant program are fire and EMS. Rescue squads are not eligible. If you enter into an agreement with more than one fire department or if you do one fire department and an EMS agency, that is considered a regional grant project. The radios we are talking about are eligible and are high priority in the decision matrix for FEMA in the way they score those applications but I have no clue as to what the odds are for us getting a grant. You are talking about fire departments all across the nation applying for this so its very competitive. We have been very successful on our grants here but I can’t tell you how we would fare on this one. I certainly believe it would be foolish not to try to take advantage of it when we can get 95% of the project paid with a 5% local match. I am supportive of us doing this incrementally but if for some reason we don’t get the AFG funding I don’t want us to be left out and always be stuck with an antiquated system. I would want the county commission to consider committing long term to building everybody into this model. My concern is that we be able to pay for it and sustain it into the future and that it not impact my fire department budget by taking away from the other important parts we have to deliver such as equipment and everything in our budget,” said Chief Green.

Mullinax suggested that if the county were to be approved for an AFG grant for fire department radios, 911 might be capable of funding the 5% local match.

On January 12th, the county commission considered adopting a $1.2 million proposal which was different from the $1.2 million plan approved Monday night.

911 Director Mullinax said the January 12 plan was really not the best option.

“When we actually looked at that, it was going to require us to still maintain the EMS frequency, still maintain the Sheriff’s department frequency, and still maintain the paging base station. It didn’t make any sense for us to spend $1.2 million when we would still have to maintain something we really can’t maintain any longer,” said Mullinax.

“This latest proposal allows us to move EMS and law enforcement over and only maintain the fire and paging channel and we can use the parts from those other two frequencies to backfill and repair the fire channel if it goes down. The ones (radios) they (rescue squad) have are still running,” said Mullinax.

“People want to know why we are not using tax dollars wisely,” said Commissioner Myron Rhody. “I think this shows we are trying to use tax dollars wisely. We didn’t just approve the (original $2.3 million deal). We are now down to getting the system upgraded and not all at one time. I like this plan better than anything I have heard so far,” said Rhody.

“I do want to stress what Myron said about us trying to be fiscally responsible with money,” added Commissioner Greg Matthews. “It was brought up (in public comments) that we don’t need all these new things but you don’t need a good new fire engine until your house is the one on fire and you don’t need a new ambulance that works until your loved ones are laying there dying. We can’t get behind again. We are in the trouble we are in because of that same mentality for 30-40 years around here. We are trying to be very financially responsible, and we appreciate everybody out there that understands that,” said Matthews.

While Commissioner Larry Green made a motion to adopt the plan which was approved Monday night, he really preferred a better option. “I don’t like this plan because I think we are throwing $300,000 away we could have gotten. I think there is money we could have used but I will support it and make a motion that we approve this plan based upon the 911 board approving it,” said Commissioner Green. Again, Green’s motion was adopted unanimously (12-0)

Commissioner Rhody suggested that the county begin making plans for long term and on-going budgeting yearly to keep the radio system updated.

During the public comments at the beginning of the meeting, Janice Clayborn of the 7th district urged the commissioners to think twice before committing to so much spending and keep in mind the poor taxpayers of the county.

“I would just like for all of you to think about the people in DeKalb County that are very low income. I speak for them because there are a lot of people that’s barely getting by, older people and some younger people. I just feel like you are not thinking of them. I think its time to stop spending all this money on all these wants and think about the poor people in this town. I think we have gotten by for a lot of years without all this fancy stuff. I think we have enough fire engines and patrol cars. We have to think about the people and we have to think about the highway department. I have brothers who work there and risk their lives every day on the roads with these old tractors with no protection of being hit. I grew up poor and I know there are people out here struggling and I wish you would think of them,” said Clayborn.

Pam Charles of the 2nd district said unlike the last meeting on January 12 when the public comment period was held at the end of the meeting, tonight (Monday) it is being held at the beginning of the meeting before she even hears any discussion on the issue in which she wants to make a comment.

Still Charles urged the commissioners to seriously consider the issue being presented.

“ I would very much urge you to support this (proposal) because it’s necessary for the county to provide those seamless services to residents of the community in terms of public safety. I urge you to give that (proposal) the weight it deserves. It bothered me from the last meeting (January 12) but I completely understood the commissioners who voted against the proposal because they wanted to see where the money was coming from. I don’t like to commit myself to money if I don’t know If I am going to have it in the checking account at the end of the month. I talked to one of my representatives and I know she had wanted a budget meeting. I talked to the county mayor today and he said he had no intention of calling a budget meeting. I don’t understand why a commissioner can’t request a meeting. I don’t understand the process. I feel that is something that is ineffective in the way we as a county are doing business. If we are discussing budget items the commissioners should be working with the county mayor to facilitate those budget discussions and be able to have a budget meeting if they want,” said Charles.

January 22, 2024
By: Dwayne Page

A resignation from the county commission!

Near the end of Monday night’s monthly meeting of the county commission, 6th district member Justin Adcock announced that he wanted to resign effective immediately. The resignation was approved by the commission.

Adcock stated no reason for his decision during the meeting but afterwards he told WJLE that it was primarily due to his private business concerns and obligations.

It’ll now be up to the commission to appoint someone from the 6th district to fill the vacancy. Adcock, like all the other commissioners, was elected in August 2022 and his four-year term does not expire until August 31, 2026. Adcock is a Republican.

Each of the seven districts in the county is to have 2 county commissioners (14 total). With Adcock’s resignation, there are now 13 members of the commission and only one in the sixth district (Jeff Barnes). Politically, the commission is made up of seven Republicans, four Democrats and two Independents.

The incumbent members are Tom Chandler, Daniel Cripps, Sabrina Farler, Myron Rhody, Susannah Cripps Daughtry, Tony Luna, Greg Matthews, Tony “Cully” Culwell, Larry Green, Glynn Merriman, Jeff Barnes, Beth Pafford, and Tim Reynolds.

Following Monday night’s meeting, County Mayor Matt Adcock announced that this 6th district county commission position is vacant and that a successor to Adcock is to be named at the next monthly meeting in February.

January 22, 2024
By: Dwayne Page

The Temperance Hall Fire Station can claim bragging rights after being awarded the DeKalb County Fire Department’s FirstBank “Station of the Year” during Saturday night’s annual awards banquet. The headlining sponsor of the banquet was Wilson Bank & Trust. Awards were also presented to the DTC Communications “Rookie Firefighter of the Year” Clayton Anstis and to Town & Lake Realty Honorary Lifetime Membership award recipients, Belk Station Commander Andy Pack, Firefighter Matt Boss of the Liberty Station and the Clyde Thomas family. The DCFD also announced the promotion of three firefighters to the officer position rank of Lieutenant, including Andrew Harvey, Luke Green, and Justin Bass.

Temperance Hall Station Commander Frank Rodegeb accepted the “Station of the Year” award from Lieutenant Matt Adcock.

Alex Woodward was the program emcee and made the award announcement.

“This station has come a long way over the past year,” said Woodward. “They have bonded as a group that not only demonstrates cares about their station but the community as a whole. When you go to this station, it is always clean, and the truck is shining. This station is staffed by a well-rounded group of firefighters who are always wanting to help any time anything arises. Many of its members are always helping with other projects such as marina committee, recruiting and retention, and at any of the scheduled work sessions of the department. This station was nominated for the upbeat spirits of its members and for always wanting to see the DeKalb County Fire Department do its best for the citizens of DeKalb County,” said Woodward.

Firefighter Clayton Anstis of the Temperance Hall Station was named the recipient of the 2023 DeKalb Telephone Cooperative (DTC) Rookie of the Year Award.

Anstis was unable to attend the banquet. Temperance Hall Station Commander Frank Rodegeb accepted the award on behalf of Anstis Saturday night. Anstis was presented his award on Monday, January 22.

This award is exclusively based on hours of training completed by a rookie firefighter who completed his/her basic recruit training during 2023.

Program emcee Alex Woodward made the announcement of the winner and the award was presented by Captain Brian Williams.

“The DeKalb County Fire Department has a rich legacy of being recognized for its excellent training programs. For the 15th consecutive year, the DeKalb County Fire Department has received statewide recognition for being an elite training department. The department’s leadership feels basic and continuous training are the best tools to give rookies when they enter the fire service. Consequently, training is the sole criteria used for selecting the “Rookie of the Year”.

“We certainly want to recognize all members who have demonstrated an outstanding level of commitment to training. Today, we especially want to recognize this recruit for completing 147.5 hours of training during his 12-month rookie period.”

“DTC Communications is honored to announce that Clayton Anstis, firefighter with the Temperance Hall Station, is the 2023 DTC Rookie of the Year”, said Woodward.

Meanwhile, the 2023 Town and Lake Realty Honorary Lifetime Membership honorees were recognized including Belk Station Commander Andy Pack, firefighter Matt Boss of the Liberty Station and the Clyde Thomas family.

Program emcee Alex Woodward made the announcements.

“Station Commander Andy Pack has served as a firefighter, station commander, and Lieutenant for a cumulative total of 18 years. He has provided the following significant contributions during his time on the Department:

*Station Commander for 11 years, Lieutenant for 2 years.
*Active with planning, organizing and working at the department fundraisers,
*Served on many committees including: Banquet Committee, Recruitment & Retention Committee, Special Events Committee, and Marina Committee,
*Conducted and assisted in multiple station improvement projects including: drainage, heating & cooling, addition to the Main Station, and other various projects,
*Long-time Member of the Extrication & Wildland Teams and Certified Emergency Medical Responder

In December 2023, the DeKalb County Fire Department’s Executive Committee reviewed and approved Station Commander Pack’s application for Honorary Lifetime Membership”.

“We are honored to officially present Station Commander Andy Pack with his DeKalb County Fire Department Honorary Lifetime Membership, sponsored by Town & Lake Realty”, said Woodward.

“The second honoree, Matt Boss has served as a firefighter for a cumulative total of 10 years & 10 months. He has provided the following significant contributions during his time on the Department:

*Leadership in the establishment of DeKalb Fire, Inc., the operating body of the DeKalb County Volunteer Fire Department,
*Donated countless hours in legal work to assist with the planning, organization, and setup of DeKalb Fire, Inc, a 501(c)(3) non-profit entity,
*Active with planning, organizing, and working for the DeKalb County Fire Department’s fundraising efforts at the DeKalb County Fair

“In December 2023, the DeKalb County Fire Department’s Executive Committee reviewed and approved Firefighter Boss for Honorary Lifetime Membership”.

“We are honored to officially present Firefighter Matt Boss with his DeKalb County Fire Department Honorary Lifetime Membership, sponsored by Town & Lake Realty,” Woodward said.

“The third honoree, the Clyde Thomas family has been a supporter of the DeKalb County Fire Department’s Awards Banquet for the past two years and their generous donation will allow a significant upgrade to the DeKalb County Fire Department’s training program”.

“This donation will allow an update to the department’s training field in addition to adding props that will allow for a more-in-depth training atmosphere to better prepare firefighters with situational scenarios.”

“Due to the support and confidence provided through the generous efforts afforded to the department, the DeKalb County Fire Department’s Executive Committee reviewed and approved the Clyde Thomas Family for Honorary Lifetime Membership”.

“We are honored to officially recognize Jan Thomas and the Clyde Thomas Family with this DeKalb County Fire Department Honorary Lifetime Membership, sponsored by Town & Lake Realty”.

The DeKalb County Volunteer Fire Department announced the promotion of three firefighters to the officer position rank of Lieutenant, including Andrew Harvey, Justin Bass, and Luke Green. They join other longtime county fire department officers Lieutenant Dusty Johnson, Lieutenant Matt Adcock, Captain Brian Williams, Chief Donny Green, Assistant Chief Anthony Boyd, Captain Blake Cantrell, and Lieutenant Kristie Johnson.