FARMINGTON — Members of the Franklin County Regional Communications Advisory Board and communications center Director Stan Wheeler will work together to amend the center’s bylaws to specify the board’s role and related matters.

They will also add a detailed process of how a disagreement should be resolved and on the direction emergency communications in the county should take.

Once the board and director make their suggested changes to the bylaws, the document will go before county commissioners for review.

Board facilitator Edward Hastings IV, who represents the fire service on the panel, told commissioners Monday that the board was looking to clarify its role and wanted to know what commissioners expect.

The bylaws were signed in July 2014 by chief law enforcement officers from Franklin County, Farmington and Wilton, three fire service representatives, the communications center director, the county Emergency Management Agency director and a representative of NorthStar EMS ambulance.

According to the document, the Advisory Board “shall only act in an advisory capacity to the director of communications.”

The bylaws do not clearly spell out the path the Advisory Board should take if it doesn’t agree with the director, Hastings said.

If the communications director disagrees with the direction of the Advisory Board then county commissioners have the final say, Commissioner Gary McGrane of Jay wrote in an email Wednesday.

“Our role is to make sure that any advice or direction is in compliance with policies set by the commissioners,” he said. “If it is not a policy issue, the commissioners shall make a final determination based on what is in the best interests of the citizens in Franklin County by mutual consent.”

If the bylaws are mute or wish to be revised, then suggestions to the commissioners will be reviewed and voted on after discussing the proposed addition or deletion, McGrane said.

If the committee is going to exist, it ought to have a purpose, Commissioner Charles Webster of Farmington said during the meeting Monday. He also sided with McGrane that if there’s ever a disagreement, the issue should be brought to commissioners and they will be the judges. The input of the Advisory Board should be heard, Webster said.

Wheeler said there is room for more specificity to be added to the bylaws.

An issue arose when some members of the Advisory Board disagreed with Wheeler about the need to replace the dispatch console immediately. No vote was taken.

Wheeler added $17,550 to his proposed communications budget for 2016-17 this year for part of a down payment on a lease/purchase option on a dispatch console. He planned to get the other half from the five-year plan of the county’s tax increment financing agreement with TransCanada. Commissioners had not approved a contract to buy a dispatch console, which Wheeler was upfront about.

Plans to use a 190-foot tall communications tower on Mosher Hill, which is 90 feet taller than the one the county had owned, were delayed until June when an agreement was reached between the owner of the tower and the county. 

Those improvements will be done in the near future.

The Budget Advisory Committee eliminated the money Wheeler added to his budget for the console, after discussing upgrading the console, buying new cards for it, and discovering a few members had knowledge that some of the communications Advisory Board was not in favor of buying the console immediately.

Commissioners approved carrying over $17,000 from the 2015-16 communications budget on June 30 that is earmarked for the Mosher Hill tower project, according to the commissioners’ meeting minutes.

dperry@sunmediagroup.net