Still Trying – County Board meeting 1-14-15

EDGAR CO. (ECWd) –

About 5-6 years ago I asked the County Chairman, Jim Keller, if an effort could be made to work towards improving our Telecommunications as it relates to 911 and our ISO score attributed to that specific entity.  That scoring is directly tied to an audit that every fire department goes through about every 5 years. Those audits compromise of three categories: Fire Department, Water Supply, Telecommunications.   My initial request was because of the low score our Fire Department had received in the category of telecommunications, which we have no control over.  Jim Keller was the Chairman at the time and that request fell on deaf ears.

The same request and offer to help was made to former 911 chairman Merl Clark.  Again, it fell on deaf ears.  Additional discussions over the years have taken place to include discussion with the current 911 Board Chairman, and according to last night’s discussion over the phone he has no recollection of those discussions.

The Kansas Fire Protection District had just gone through another ISO audit near the end of 2014, and although they were able to lower the overall rating yet again by one point, from a 7 to a 6, the telecommunication score was simply unacceptable.  Considering 6 years ago we were an ISO 9 community we are pretty excited about a three point drop during that time frame and believe with proper education, training, and documentation the entire county could benefit from a better score out of our 911 system.

My concerns raised during the County Board meeting this week are based on the fact several categories with our 911 system received a ZERO score, which hurts everyone in this county. For those Fire Departments that are on the bubble for another point drop it is clear that a little effort from our 911 board might lead to a huge savings for everyone.  Such effort could save money for each and every property insurance policy holder; home, business, farm, etc. in the entire county with the exception of a few insurance carriers that use their own formula instead of the national recognized ISO system.  (Click here to see a copy of the Edgar County Telecommunications record and scores from ISO)

I would like to clarify my comment during the county board meeting.  I specifically called for a replacement of the entire 911 Board and should have qualified that statement.  I believe the ones that need to be replaced are the ones who have been on that board since day one, those who have participated in the illegal expenditures of our tax dollars exposed several years ago, and those who had no clue what ISO was, let alone the importance it plays in the County’s insurance rates, which happens to be the current Chairman.  Other than those folks, there are two maybe three that deserve our support at this time.

Video of the County Board meeting.