In October, it was brought to the attention of Daviess County Fiscal Court how badly the Daviess County Detention Center needed a new radio system. At Thursday’s Fiscal Court meeting, County commissioners approved DCDC for a reconfigured public safety radio system at a bid price almost $30,000 less than initially anticipated.
Commissioners approved the lowest bid, which was made by Ohio Valley 2-Way Radio. With a base bid of $7,600 and a total bid price of nearly $10,650, commissioners were happy to see the expected costs much lower than originally predicted. The other bidder, VEI Communications, had presented a higher bid of $15,645.
Trott Communications visited with Judge-Executive Al Mattingly, County commissioners, the Daviess County Sheriff’s Office, the Daviess County Fire Department, DCDC, 911 Director Paul Nave, AMR Ambulance and Daviess County Emergency Management Agency to discuss replacing the County’s entire, outdated radio system with new equipment.
During that meeting, Trott Communications recommended the jail’s radio system issues be addressed first as its infrastructure needed the quickest fix. Officials with the company suggested the jail receive a temporary fix at a budgetary estimate of $40,000 that would redesign the jail’s radio system within 12 months.
Mattingly said this reconfiguration of the public safety radio system would address all of the issues the jail had been having with their radios, which included weak or nonexistent signal in certain areas of the facility.
“I’m pretty pleased — I mean, they gave us an estimate of, what, $40,000?” Mattingly said. “And I was concerned we’d be skimping [the jail by choosing a lower-priced system], but they assured us this is quality software.”
Fiscal Court Purchasing Agent Jordan Johnson said the Ohio Valley 2-Way Radio system would be installed at the jail between Dec. 15 and Dec. 23.
