Lawrence, Mercer Counties 911 centers looking into pros and cons of potential merger
It's not cheap to run a 911 dispatch center. In Lawrence County, it costs up to $3 million a year and in Mercer County, it costs more than $4 million.
Public safety leaders in both counties told KDKA-TV it might make more sense to work under the same roof and now they're a step closer to finding out how a merger could help or hurt both counties.
Lawrence and Mercer counties' 911 dispatch centers already work hand in hand every day.
"We're already operating as a 911 center together," said Frank Jannetti, director of the Mercer County Department of Public Safety.
"We work very closely, we share radio systems, CAD systems, computer dispatch systems, phone systems," Chad Strobel, director of the Lawrence County Department of Public Safety.
Not to mention, Strobel and Jannetti are good friends.
"I don't buy a box of paper clips without calling Chad first to see if he needs a box," Jannetti said.
Both of them said it just makes sense to join forces.
"We just think it's, you know, with our call volumes, our size, our populations, that we would work well together as a unified 911 center," Strobel said. "And it would be a little bit more responsible with taxpayer money and you know still provide top-notch service to our residents."
Lawrence County commissioners voted Tuesday to allow the public safety director to move forward with applying for grant money from the state to have a feasibility study done. Mercer County commissioners will take the same vote soon.
"The study will tell us advantages or the detriments of being together in the same location," Jannetti said. "They'll look at call volume, where we are today with the capabilities of our respective centers, the age of the centers, all of those things. They'll look at our respective budgets. I think the financial part of it is important, how we're funded."
The two dispatch centers share the same struggles, including rising costs, and new technology that comes out is getting more expensive.
"There's a lot more technology out there that could help in the long run. That might not be quite affordable for individual counties and coming together using additional funding we may receive to improve our technology," Strobel said.
They said it's also hard to find employees, especially part-timers.
"So if we can combine services, use each other's employees, have full staff, have the full capabilities, it would be great," said Strobel.
They're not reinventing the wheel; a number of counties have combined 911 centers.
Jannetti and Strobel said they wouldn't be looking to make any job cuts. In fact, they believe merging would create more opportunities for employees to advance. They also said people dialing 911 wouldn't notice any changes.
"I don't think the residents. We'll either have an advantage or a detriment if both counties have one 911 center. But the dispatching could improve, especially along the borders, and again, the study will tell us all of those things," Jannetti said.
Jannetti and Strobel wanted to stress that their 911 workers are not losing their jobs, and the centers are not closing right now. They are just hoping for a feasibility study to reveal them the pros and cons. They put a proposal into the state to seek the funds for the study. Both counties would review the findings together and decide whether it makes sense to merge.