Miami County’s Communication Center should have the ability to receive and respond to text messages by mid-2016.

The county commission Dec. 10 approved purchase of an Emergency Call Works Next Generation Telephone System from Motorola Solutions for $312,411. An added cost of $420,000 will cover maintenance for 10 years and a system hardware refresh after five years.

The purchase will be made as a change order to the county’s contract with Motorola for a new 911 center radio system backbone that also is being installed.
Jeff Busch, Communication Center director, said the system complies with requirement for the center to handle texts. The current system does not accept texts and could not be upgraded to handle that function, he said.

The new telephone system’s maintenance agreement includes updates of software to comply with future requirements such as receiving digital images and video.

The request was for the phone system for the center dispatch. There is a separate administrative phone system.

Busch told commissioners the request, approved recently by the 911 center board, included six positions for the dispatch center and six for the backup emergency operations center in another location in Troy.

The system, he said, is designed to allow use of both centers simultaneously for 12 stations in the event of a major emergency event.

Quotes were received for a system to ensure the price was inline with what others were asking. The project did not have to be bid under state law that exempts 911 phone systems from bidding requirements, Busch said.

He said center staff also sat in on demonstrations of available systems and found the system being purchased was the most user friendly.

In other business Dec. 10, the commission heard from Mike Wolf of WS Electronics about commission discussions of buying new portable and mobile radios to go along with the new radio system backbone. The system will allow agencies – police, fire and emergency medical services – to communicate easier with others across the state, when needed.

The commissioners were expected to agree to an incentive package offered by Motorola to purchase radios for the county agencies before year’s end. A consultant working with the Communication Center on its upgrades said the offer was 45 percent less than the cost to buy the radios under the state purchasing contract.

Wolf said he and another radio manufacturer, Harris, would like the county to offer the opportunity for bidding on the radios.

Commission President Jack Evans said Wolf’s request would be referred to Busch.