PARIS — Oxford County commissioners approved an equipment upgrade for the Regional Communications Center on Oct. 3 to allow Cumberland County’s dispatch center to handle calls and dispatch first responders in the event of a catastrophic failure. 

The lack of a backup plan, should the center experience a catastrophe or be severely short-staffed, was a top concern of first responders and members of the county communications advisory board who addressed commissioners last month.

“It solves a problem that could be huge for us,” county Administrator Zane Loper said. “It’s an insurance policy that says we’ll never not be able to dispatch our deputies and EMS.”

He said Communications Director Geffrey Inman and Assistant Director Nicole Newton have been working hard to address some of the issues raised at the meeting.

“It’s a legitimate concern that they brought to us and it’s nice to see such an efficient response from the RCC,” Loper said. “Incredible work.”

Oxford County will pay a one-time fee of $52,986.94 for equipment upgrades from the communications center capital reserve account. Further steps involving contracts and memorandums of understanding to finalize the connection with Cumberland County will be the next steps, Loper said.

Currently, if a 911 call is not answered at the Oxford County Regional Communications Center at 26 Western Ave. in Paris, that call is routed to the Cumberland County Regional Communications Center at 22 Main St. in Windham, where they answer the call, find out the location, and send the call back to Oxford County.

Commission Chairperson David Duguay of Byron suggested including the expense in next year’s budget and using that to replace the funds in the reserve account.

With the equipment upgrade, Cumberland County dispatchers will be able to answer calls and dispatch first responders using instructions and information in reference books that will be provided, Inman said. 

Cumberland County will only receive calls in the event of extreme extenuating circumstances, like a lightning strike, power failure, or if only one person is working the dispatch center and is busy with other calls.

Inman said the equipment is essentially future-proof, in that it can still be used when the 911 system at the dispatch center is eventually upgraded to a new system.

“This is our stopgap to protect the citizens of the county and keep moving the 911 system forward,” Inman said.

Nearly all of the communications towers used by the county have secure internet links rather than microwave links, he said.

“We were still able to communicate with the tower, but now we’ve got our main link which carries the information in a nice clean form to the other tower,” Inman said. “It will connect us so we can talk with the responders in Cumberland.”

Commissioners agreed with the life safety necessity of the upgrade.

“How many times have we talked about, ‘well if x, y, and z happens it could be really bad,’ and then suddenly it does happen and we’re caught short because we didn’t make proper preparations,” Commissioner Tim Turner of Buckfield said.

“I’m trying to build a robust plan,” Loper said.

Inman noted that the county is also working with the town of Sweden to get another communications tower built there.

Two new trainees have been signed off for the call taker and dispatcher desk, allowing them to work full time in the communications center, Assistant Director Newton said.

There are three people training at the academy and will hopefully be signed off by the end of the year, she said. In addition, there are a few interviews scheduled with potential dispatchers.

“Everybody’s working together to make this happen,” Inman said. “We’re building a strong team and you can feel it starting to come together.”

He noted that most other dispatch centers in the state are also dealing with staffing issues.

Commissioners also hired Dawn Tolman as a part-time temporary dispatcher at $33 per hour. 

The commission also voted to lower the required minimum hours for working dispatch for Newton from six to two hours and increased her pay to $33 per hour to be consistent with the other part-time dispatchers. They also instituted 24 hours of vacation time for Newton, to be used within six months.

The commission will next meet at 9 a.m. Oct. 22 at the Oxford County Superior Courthouse on Western Avenue.