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August 18, 2008

Essex County 911 radio lines damaged

By LOHR McKINSTRY

LEWIS -- The loss of special telephone lines between Long Lake and the Essex County Enhanced 911 center may have imperiled emergency communication for three days.

The dedicated lines are used by the county 911 center in Lewis to control Long Lake's radio system and dispatch its fire and ambulance services.

Through a contractual agreement, Essex County answers 911 calls for the Town of Long Lake in Hamilton County.

Interim Essex County Manager Daniel Palmer said two phone companies were involved, Verizon and Frontier, and they blamed each other for the outage.

"The problem is the two vendors. When it (the line) hits the Hamilton County line, it switches over to Frontier. The lines went down at 3 a.m. (on Aug. 6). Frontier had problems getting people out."

Frontier apparently has low staffing, he said, and couldn't get technicians to work on the lines. Service was not restored until 3 p.m. Friday, Aug. 8.

Both companies also tried to blame Wells Communications, the county's radio maintenance contractor, even though Wells had nothing to do with the problem, Palmer said.

He said a lightning storm that moved through the area initially took out the lines.

"Those (lines) became mismatched through the electrical storm, and they weren't able to sort it out," Palmer said.

"You're at the mercy of two or three vendors. The Public Service Commission was involved the next day. They were on both Verizon and Frontier."

The county pays for two lines, using one as main radio transmission line to Long Lake and the other as a backup.

"Both lines failed; that's the issue," Palmer said.

The county is negotiating with Verizon over the cost of the lines, which were substantially more expensive than the estimate the county was given.

Long Lake officials have not signed the contract yet for the dispatch service but have said they will do so once the costs are sorted out.

Palmer said he wants to have a meeting with all parties so they can explain what happened after the lines failed. The Essex County Board of Supervisors radio subcommittee will also discuss the issue at its next meeting Aug. 26.

The line failure meant Long Lake emergency-services volunteers had to staff their stations 24 hours a day until repairs were made.

Essex County Enhanced-911 Coordinator Donald Jaquish said the calls were still answered at Lewis, then the Hamilton County Sheriff's Department was contacted to dispatch Long Lake.

lmckinstry@pressrepublican.com

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