Dale County takes $694,500 ‘leap of faith’

One thing everyone agreed on was that it was “a leap of faith.” The other thing they all agreed on is “we are at the point where we don’t have a choice.”

That was the common comment as the Dale County Commission unanimously agreed to sign a $694,000 contract to upgrade the emergency communication system for first responders in the county at a meeting Sept. 22.

Upgrading the emergency communications within Dale County has been a topic of discussion for months. That an upgrade was needed was not the issue. The issue was how to pay for it.

Dialogue with Motorola, a communications provider, and neighboring first responders at Troy University, resulted in Tuesday’s decision to commit to the upgrade. “Overall this system will provide us the best coverage for Dale County,” Blankenship said. “The fact that we’ve partnered with Troy University will be a great asset.”

Toy University has towers from outside Dothan to Troy, Blankenship said. “They are allowing us to put equipment on these towers. They are equipped with everything needed and they are doing this at no charge because it helps with communications between campus locations.”

The commission agreed to finance the project over eight years at an interest rate of 2.29 percent from Commercial Bank of Ozark.

The system will be paid for largely from the new process serving fees that are expected to be collected under new legislation.

The purpose of the proposed bill is to supplement the budget of the Dale County Sheriff’s Office, Dale County Commission Chairman Mark Blankenship explained at the July meeting during which commissioners decided to ask State Rep. Steve Clouse to introduce the process serving fee legislation.

The process serving fee will be $25 for each document served by the sheriff’s department for “matters pending or to be commenced in a court inside of Dale County,” according to the bill.

The process-serving fee will be $50 for each document served by the sheriff’s department for “matters pending or to be commenced outside of Dale County,” according to the bill.

Blankenship said the funds generated by the process-serving fee would be earmarked for sheriff’s office law enforcement vehicles, communication equipment and other technology for the sheriff’s department.

“The most crucial part of this whole thing is our ability to collect the new process server fees,” Blankenship said. “We need to maximize collection of that.”

“It's a stretch, really going out on a limb,” Blankenship said. “But we’ve kicked this down the road just about as far as we can kick it. We’re at a point where we don’t have a choice.”

“It’s a leap of faith,” “said Olson in agreement. “It’s nerve wracking.”

“Its more nerve wracking for that deputy walking up the front door of a house not knowing if his radio is going to work, “ added Troy University Police Chief John McCall.