Supervisors approve bevy of items for communications center

The drawings, specifications, budget and contract for the estimated $4.35 million Washington County Communications Center were approved by the Washington County Board of Supervisors.

At their meeting on Tuesday, May 28, Matt Miller, a project manager with Carl A. Nelson and Company, the general contractor in charge of the project, presented the final plans for the project.

'We've designed and put together a very robust storm-hardened structure that's designed to protect the dispatch, radio services, technology that's inside that building and the emergency operations center,” he said.

The masonry building will meet FEMA standards for storm hardening and has been designed with several technology upgrades in mind. Fiber-optic lines will be rerouted to be brought into the building with an Uninterruptible Power Supply (UPS) as backup power to ensure dispatchers never lose power or contact.

'They have immediate backup power in the whole dispatch room and a generator backup that as soon as it kicks in will replace the UPS power,” he said.

Special cooling has been included in the design plans to best accommodate the equipment that may require specific temperatures to perform at its best. A fire protection system has been designed specifically for the technology as well, to only put out the fire and not damage other materials.

Miller said the budget for the project is $4.35 million with $875,000 being dedicated to the technology allowance to support the equipment that will go into the building. Multiple bid packages will be set out for the project beginning Monday, June 3. Bids are due back on Wednesday, June 26, with contracts expected to be awarded approximately two weeks after. An official groundbreaking ceremony for the project has been scheduled for Wednesday, July 10.