The Howard County Board of Commissioners approved a recommendation Tuesday to budget about $1.4 million — about $200,000 less than the county’s dispatch center says it needs — for a consolidated dispatch center.
The budget is part of a draft of an interlocal agreement between the county and the city of Kokomo to merge their dispatch centers into one as a cost saver. The budget came as a recommendation from the Citizen’s Committee for Consolidation.
If the agreement stays with a $1.4 million budget, it will likely result in the termination of 10 dispatch center staff if the Howard County Council, Kokomo Common Council and Kokomo Mayor Greg Goodnight also sign off on the agreement.
Nick Capozzoli, the supervisor of county dispatch, said the center would need a budget of about $1.6 million to operate effectively and pay its employees the same as the city dispatch center’s employees.
Six of the current 31 employees would lose their jobs with that amount, he said. It would take about $1.9 million to save all jobs, he said.
The minimum staff needed during the dispatch center’s busiest times would be five people, and during the slowest times it would need four, Capozzoli said.
“We don’t want to staff and be under-prepared because we don’t know when emergencies are going to strike,” he said.
With $1.4 million, it would be difficult for dispatchers to take breaks, Capozzoli said.
“We also have to take into consideration that 911 dispatchers, you have to give them breaks,” he said, “you have to give them time away from the console, you have to give them some sort of relief because this is a job that’s not just hands on the phone, taking a call and moving on.”
The job cuts would especially strain the late-night shift, which has fewer dispatchers, he said.
County dispatcher Tracy Comfort said it isn’t every night that there are multiple emergencies at the same time, but it is always a possibility. She referred to one night in which she worked with little help and had to manage three emergencies, she said.
“I don’t want an officer to die on my shift because you guys are so worried about meeting a number and not looking at schedules,” she said.
Commissioner Tyler Moore asked what would happen if the dispatch center paid all of its employees after the consolidation at the lower county rates instead of the city’s pay.
Capozzoli said he based most of his figures off the city’s pay rate because that would leave the dispatch center comparable to the one in Delaware County. Paying the staff based off what the city dispatchers make would keep things more fair and prevent morale loss, he said.
Consolidation committee member Pat Crittendon pointed out during the meeting that the committee was not the one to come up with the idea for a new budget, it received the 911 consolidation as a task.
“It’s like we have been demonized, and we’re trying to do something nobody wanted us to do,” she said. “I’m at the point where I’m ready to just resign from the committee because I feel like we’ve been set up.”
The commissioners at the end of the discussion and again at the end of the meeting thanked the committee members for their work.
• Daniel Human is the Kokomo Tribune business reporter. He can be reached at 765-454-8570 or at daniel.human@kokomotribune.com.
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