CHAFFEE MAYOR SEES CITY OFFICIALS SUPPORTING 911

CHAFFEE -- Mayor Ron Moyers thinks Chaffee city officials will support a 911 issue on the Nov. 8 ballot.

"I think the council is a lot more informed," Moyers said of a recent presentation by Mike Westrich, a rural Benton resident, chief of the NBC Fire Department, and a member of the steering committee that put together a feasibility study on jointly operating a 911 emergency phone system in Scott and New Madrid counties.

Cost for a 911 system would be 15 percent of a customer's base telephone bill. In Chaffee, that amounts to $1.13 per month per customer and in Sikeston $1.37. Business phones would be higher.

Westrich said the plan for Scott and New Madrid counties includes an enhanced 911 system, which would display the telephone number and location of the caller. Help could then be sent to the location even though the caller may not be able to speak.

The committee decided to have a joint system since Sikeston is in both counties, Westrich told the Scott City Council. Having Sikeston in a joint operation will generate enough revenue to pay for the enhanced system, he said.

Sikeston has a basic 911 system, which only displays the phone number of the caller. Sikeston officials want to upgrade to the enhanced system to better ensure proper responses in an emergency, Westrich said.

The type of dispatching service would depend on negotiations after the election, Westrich said.

Westrich said Scott City has an enhanced system and the committee sees no reason to take that away.

Agencies may experience financial relief in dispatching costs if 911 is approved, Westrich said. He said liability exposure would increase with a 911 system since people would expect quicker response times and competence from dispatchers. "There are a lot of things we can do with proper planning," Westrich said. "My goal is to improve 911 service in the county."

Moyers said city officials had a problem with the information they first received on 911. That led the city to think 911 would replace Chaffee's dispatching, Moyers said. But Moyers said a 911 system is not designed for regular calls to a police department. He said he didn't see how Chaffee's dispatching service would be affected since non-emergency calls would still have to be handled.

"I think that 911 is excellent," Moyers said.

The mayor said he was still unsure about putting 911 dispatching in Sikeston, but if that was the best plan he could support it.

Alderman Jerry Wolsey said he would do whatever he could to protect the jobs of the five dispatchers here. He said the city would still need its own dispatch service for animal complaints and non-emergency calls.