Council approves money for fire department radios
The Daviess County Council heard some additional appropriation requests at their regular April meeting Wednesday morning.
The Council approved requests for $20,629 for utilities from the CAGIT fund, and $27,972 from the County Health Department. The County Health Nurse said the money was from reimbursements received for vaccines and would be placed back in the Health Department’s line item in the budget. She also told the Council the Health Department was now in the position to offer free vaccines to people without insurance or those who have insurance which will not pay for vaccines. A person’s eligibility would be checked when they came to the Health Department.
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The Daviess County Council on Wednesday approved requests from Daviess County Emergency Management for $2,204 for 9-1-1 location signs at the overpasses on I-69 through the County. The State of Indiana has refused to pay for these signs which are needed as landmarks in emergency situations. To facilitate emergency response, Daviess County has placed location signs at each overpass.
Emergency Management Director Paul Goss also asked for $119,722 to pay for radios for the County’s ten volunteer fire departments. Goss told the Council that the new radios would be compatible with each other and the Sheriff’s Department. The new radios would allow departments to communicate with each other when more than one department responded to an emergency. Sheriff Jerry Harbstreit said that currently the fire departments are forced to use the Sheriff’s channel to communicate and that limits the Sheriff’s Department’s ability to respond to other emergencies in other areas of the county. County Councilman Mike Sprinkle said the money in the Statewide E-9-1-1 fund does not come from county taxes but are funds collected by the state from cell-phone use fees.