Page County (IA)

10-26-2017 from KMA Broadcasting (Clarinda) -- Work continues on funding an emergency communications overhaul in Page County.

At its regular meeting Tuesday morning, the Page County Board of Supervisors unanimously approved a resolution authorizing and approving a loan agreement for the issuance of $1.74 million in general obligation emergency communications equipment bonds. The loan will pay for the building of a new 700-megahertz digital communications system that will improve county-wide coverage and connect the county with the statewide communications system. During the meeting, Emergency Management Coordinator Kris Grebert told the council work has already begun on the new system.

"I'm meeting with a site walk guy today to look at three towers to make sure they have line of sight," said Grebert. "Tomorrow, I'm meeting with the Motorola people so that they can actually get some more definition on the structure of each tower so they know exactly what is going to go on them. We're doing work right now on the radio part."

Banker's Bank of Madison, Wisconsin, was the low-bidder for the bond with an interest rate of just under 1.7 percent. The entire system is expected to be operational in August 2018. The board also heard from Grebert on some maintenance work upcoming on a county-owned tower west of Clarinda. Grebert says there are some light bulbs on the structure that need replaced.

"There are blinking bulbs on top of the tower and they are still working," said Grebert. "It's the marker bulbs that are about 100 feet down that have stopped working. It's a triangle tower with one bulb in each corner of the triangle, and only one of those triangle bulbs is working."