A meeting of the minds took place in the Cook County Commissioners’ room Tuesday, January 25, 2011 to discuss communication upgrades coming to Cook County. County commissioners and numerous department heads met in the first of what will be regularly scheduled work sessions, an initiative suggested by Highway Maintenance Supervisor Russell Klegstad to address a variety of topics, including “issues that are not issues yet.”
In accordance with Minnesota’s Open Meeting Law, work sessions must be posted ahead of time and are open to the public like regular meetings. “Work sessions are great,” Klegstad told the Cook County News-Herald. “…A person can share with the board about ideas, thoughts, and possibilities without having to have all the ducks lined up or trying to get a vote or even an answer.” Klegstad found work sessions to be valuable when he was an Itasca County commissioner and the county was locating and building communication towers.
The Allied Radio Matrix for Emergency Response (ARMER), a means of providing radio communication between all governmental agencies that is being promoted by the State of Minnesota, will call for four communication towers to be added to the nine that currently stand in Cook County. The county has a variety of agreements with different entities regarding use of the existing towers. Sheriff Mark Falk suggested coming up with a template that could provide consistency in those contracts.
Falk said the ARMER program would call for replacing battery power with electric power on a tower in Hovland, although some residents on the road leading to the tower have not at this point granted easement for electric lines across their property. Falk also said AT&T wants to replace two towers up the Gunflint Trail that do not have the specifications needed for the technology AT&T wants to use – one mid-Trail and the other near Magnetic Rock further up the Trail.
If Cook County decides to join ARMER, Falk said, a “system technical administrator” would need to be appointed—and right now, no one has officially been designated the point person. Presently calls are being directed to numerous county employees—Attorney Tim Scannell, Highway Engineer David Betts, and Assessor/Land Commissioner Mary Black—as well as contractors Duane Ege and Jeff Nemitz. Commissioner Jim Johnson said the county needs a point person, whether it’s a county administrator, a contractor, or “someone internally.”
While a county administrator wouldn’t necessarily have expertise in tower communications, Klegstad said, a new county position could be created for someone with that expertise. Klegstad figured the cost of hiring a consultant for a year would be about the same as paying a county employee for five or six years.
Commissioner Fritz Sobanja suggested they need someone with technical capabilities, skill in negotiating contracts, and the ability to coordinate communication among county staff and commissioners. Tim Scannell said his office could continue to draft contracts.
Commissioner Bruce Martinson wondered about sharing a position with Lake County. Sheriff Falk said Lake County contracts with St. Louis County, which he thought hired a full-time employee just to take care of Lake County.
Duane Ege said at least until he retires, he and Nemitz can handle the technical issues, but someone to do the administrative work is needed. A person might be able to work his or her way out of a job as tower issues are addressed, but it usually doesn’t work that way, he said.
The county is likely to at least partially gear up for the ARMER program, the sheriff said, but the fire departments will need to weigh the advantages against the costs. Ege said the 1999 blowdown brought half a million dollars in government relief and the 2007 Ham Lake fire brought a million dollars, money which was used to build communication towers.
To join the ARMER program, the county could either put up its own towers or partner with the state if the state put them up. Do we want to own all the towers in the county? County Attorney Tim Scannell wondered. “We want to own all the land and all the towers,” Duane Ege replied. He said the state would like to give Cook County funding to build new towers.
Ege said the county loses money each year by not owning the Lutsen tower, and if the county owned all the towers, it could make money. If communication companies cannot get the tower space and technology they want from the county, they will appeal to private property owners. Scannell said private companies would prefer using county towers to building their own.
Sheriff Falk said towers tend to lease for $900-$1,500 a month. “There’s a window of opportunity here,” he said.
Falk agreed to set up and coordinate a subcommittee of the Cook County Communications Committee, with help from Duane Ege and Tim Scannell, that would create a job description for a tower communications coordinator.
County board work sessions will be scheduled for the fourth Tuesday of the month from 1:30 to 3:00 p.m. when the board has a topic it wants to discuss at length. The topic of the next work session, to be held February 22, will be the Open Meeting Law and protocols for regular board meetings, public hearings, and work sessions.
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