City and county officials faced the reality of the Flathead 911 Emergency Communications Center fiscal situation on Aug. 29 and are likely to propose a levy to taxpayers to pay for the annual operating costs.
“I think the general consensus is that’s the best way to go,” Flathead County Commissioner Jim Dupont said in an interview. “(The center) serves the entire county. So everybody would pay that fee just like they do, for instance, for the dump. It’s just a different way of funding it other than how we’re trying to do it now.”
The bill for the center came in significantly higher than city and county officials had originally anticipated.
Several cost overruns occurred in the building and development of the center and a $6.1 million budget ballooned to $9.27 million, according to an audit report presented at a joint meeting of city councilors, county commissioners and other employees of the 911 Center at Kalispell City Hall.
With a clearer view of the budget, officials now have to decide the best way to establish a viable long-term financing plan to fund operations.
The annual cost to run the call center is roughly $2.5 million, which is what the tax levy would help pay for, Dupont said. The levy, if passed by voters, would be added to county property taxes.
“You obviously have to work on how to propose that for a vote,” Dupont said.
The center opened in June last year and acts as a centralized dispatch for emergency calls across the county. Since February, the center has received roughly 180,000 calls.
“I think the board is doing the best job that we can,” Dupont, who is also the former Flathead County sheriff, said at the Aug. 29 meeting. “We certainly need tweaking in finances. Hopefully that will never happen again.
“But I think we can all be proud of (the 911 center) and be damn proud knowing that anybody that calls 911 will get the best service we can provide.”
About $675,000 of the budget overrun can be blamed on higher-than-expected costs for computer, communications and phone equipment, according to a memo by the finance directors from Flathead County, Kalispell and Columbia Falls.
The memo also points out limited financial oversight on the project, an inaccurate assessment of future cash balances and changes in coding contributing to the stark difference between the planned budget and the real one.
“We need to account for those (cost overruns). We are all responsible for that,” Kalispell Mayor Tammi Fisher said. “We atone for those (overruns) by going forward and being sure we have a solid plan.”
The one-year-old center has also had to deal with higher maintenance costs for towers around the valley, employee turnover and challenges with the software system in place.
“We anticipated growing pains to a certain extent,” Columbia Falls City Councilor Mike Shepard said after the meeting.
Shepard, who has been involved with the 911 center from the beginning, said he agreed with Dupont about a tax levy being the best option.
“Some of us have realized that we have to just keep going forward,” he said, “remembering that if we even spend too much to save someone’s life it’s better than not spending enough.”