KOSCIUSKO —
A joint meeting of the Attala County Board of Supervisors and the Kosciusko Board of Aldermen held Friday ended with a plan for a new partnership on the Attala County/Kosciusko 911 Department Friday at the Chancery Building.
The Attala County Board of Supervisors had been working toward taking on the city/county department by October 1.
Coming together
“We met with the mayor (Jimmy Cockroft) earlier this week to discuss the joint effort of the 911 system. That is greatly needed,” Attala County Board of Supervisors President Kary Ellington said. “We’ve got to come together for a common goal.”
Mayor Jimmy Cockroft addressing both his board members sans Alderman Robert Ellis and the supervisors said that they could all agree that change was needed.
One change would be to form a 911 commission or board.
Cockroft asked the supervisors to construct a commission that would be comprised of one city official, one county official, emergency management director, city and county fire chiefs, chief of police and sheriff. Non-voting members would be Med-Stat Ambulatory Services and the 911 director.
Cockroft said his expertise wasn’t in emergency management but with a commission they would be able to have the right people to make decisions.
Once decisions were to be made by the commission, they would be presented to the aldermen and/or supervisors for the final authority.
“The people that are working with it day to day would have more input,” Cockroft said.
Money
The city and county officials agreed to a 50/50 split the salaries of the dispatchers and directors.
And the city, Cockroft said would continue to house the 911 at the Kosciusko Police Department.
Discussion between the supervisors and aldermen concluded that 911 funds collected from phone bills, both home and digital, would be given to the city for the department with the exception of $24,000 a year for signage replacement and repair in the county.
“We’ve all agreed to split it 50/50,” Supervisor Troy Hodges said. “I think we split it down the middle.”
“But I think y’all need to meet and fine tune the figures,” Hodges said. “Let’s come back and sign the proposal and move on.”
In was discussed that the county would be billed monthly for their portion of the salaries and in turn, the city would be billed for monthly usage of Attala County Jail.
Applications
Applications are being sought for a 911 director and the process will continue.
The new city/county agreement would not take effect until October 2013.
“These talks over the last few months have been good for all of us,” Cockroft said.
An formal agreement on the city/county 911 department could be in place within 30 days.
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City, county plan new 911 partnership
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