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Seeking less to run Mahoning County 911 center
YOUNGSTOWN
Mahoning County’s emergency management director is asking for less money to operate the county’s 911 dispatching center next year.
In a Wednesday budget hearing, Clark Jones asked the county commissioners for $916,033 from the county’s general fund for next year, compared with the center’s authorized spending of $954,925 for 2011.
The hearing was part of the preparation of the county’s 2012 budget, which commissioners hope to enact by Dec. 15.
The commissioners will have tough funding choices to make because county department requests for 2012 from the general fund total $64.9 million, but revenue totaling only $47.9 million has been certified for next year by the county budget commission.
The general fund is the county’s main operating fund.
Jones said the reduction was made possible by cuts in telephone-line costs and a three-year contract for the county’s 14 emergency dispatchers working in the 911 answering center, which includes no pay raises.
The dispatchers’ average pay is about $17 an hour, said Michelle Varso, county emergency management agency fiscal manager.
Eighty-five percent of the budget for the 911 dispatching center, which operates around the clock in the county administration building on Boardman Street, is spent on wages and benefits, with much-smaller shares of the budget going for supplies, equipment, repairs, telephone service and other utilities.
The county-operated center, which does emergency dispatching for many of the county’s rural areas and smaller communities, answers about 24,000 calls for a service annually, including 911 calls and calls from 10-digit police, fire and ambulance service telephone numbers.