The Pulaski County Justice Center’s power supply problems appear to be resolved. Its battery backup system was replaced Monday, according to Maintenance Supervisor Jeff Johnston. “Over the past few months, we’ve had several power outages, the most recent being Saturday evening,” he told the county commissioners Monday. “Through these power outages, we’ve found that the uninterruptible power source or UPS was drastically overloaded, and when it would try to take over as backup power, the system would shut down, rendering our 911 dispatch center inoperable, along with phone systems, radio, and Justice Center doors.”
Johnston explained that the old system was running at 180 percent of its intended capacity. He said the new one is much larger. “The current system’s operating at 22 percent, which allows for future sheriff’s department and 911 dispatch needs.”
Johnston said the county’s dispatch center had to be shut down while the changeover took place early Monday morning. During that time, a Pulaski County dispatcher was handling 911 calls from Fulton County, according to Sheriff Jeff Richwine. “A bright spot of this is it’s kind of a good training thing for us,” Richwine said. “If the dispatch center does go down, we know that it’s always been in the plans that we could move to Fulton County and take over one of their spots and actually run our radios and stuff from over there, and it worked.”
Johnston explained that he was granted emergency permission to buy the new backup system for a cost of $25,000. That will be split evenly between the maintenance and sheriff’s departments. Johnston said the maintenance department’s budget will cover the $2,400 installation cost.
The county commissioners ratified their approval of the purchase during Monday’s meeting.
