Howard County will use $117,640 in federal funds to strengthen county police ability to deal with a major disaster by equipping a full backup 911 center in the Southern District police station and upgrading the county's mobile command abilities.
The county is adding $13,105 in required matching money, for that project and for a companion effort to start training people to operate a proposed drug court for the county. The drug court training effort is expected to cost $13,412.
The federal grant is more than $10,000 smaller than last year's, according to Nancy Barr, the Police Department's grants coordinator, because it is based on the county's crime rate, which has been dropping.
Most of the money -- $82,640 -- will go to fully equip the Southern District 911 center near Routes 29 and 216, which now would only be partly functional if the main center in Ellicott City were destroyed or disabled.
"Now, if we had to go to the Southern District [911 center], we'd have to use the [computer] server at the George Howard building," said Tami Bull, head of research and planning for the police. Dispatchers would have to write calls down on paper cards, she said. The money from the Bureau of Justice Assistance of the Justice Department would buy a second server and other computer equipment to give the backup 911 center equal capabilities, Bull said.
"There should be no glitches in our emergency system," Bull said.
Another $35,000 will go to upgrade the county's police/fire mobile command post, a motor home-style vehicle, and improve communications and information with individual police officers working on a major incident.
Barr said new computer equipment will enable the mobile unit to act as its own dispatch center, so units involved at one major incident can be controlled separately from what is occurring elsewhere in the county by using a separate radio channel. In addition, officers involved in a major incident can be fed more information -- such as the history of police contacts with a site they are dispatched to, or a person they must deal with.
"This will allow us to do on a swift timetable of what we wouldn't be able to do for another two or three years," Bull said.
The drug court money would go to pay for training of judges, lawyers, addictions counselors and a drug court coordinator to prepare the county if County Executive James N. Robey decides to devote money in his next budget to creation of the court in Howard County.
A 25-member Local Law Enforcement Advisory Board headed by county police Chief Wayne Livesay decided how to distribute the federal money.