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Chance Conversation Nets Police New Communications Center
Thursday, August 19, 2004
When the Georgetown Police Department's dispatch center was first damaged, it was far from an electrifying experience.
Back in May, a lightning storm caused electricity to shoot through the telephone lines at the station and essentially, in the words of Chief James Mulligan, "fried our communications systems."
Staff from Randmark Communications was brought in to get everything up and running again, but given the damage it was essentially a bandaging job - the station would eventually need new equipment.
"We were going to do work to fix it up, because there is no money in the budget to replace it," Mulligan said.
Then lightning struck again - in a good way. A chance conversation at a family function netted the Police Department secondhand communications equipment that will nevertheless mark a significant upgrade to the station's current dispatch center.
Mulligan's twin brother is chief of police in Merrimack, N.H. He is also serving as acting town administrator until the position is filled permanently. During that same family function, he offered to show a few family members around his station, and Mulligan joined them.
"As we're touring his station, we walked past the dispatch center and he says 'we're replacing all of this,'" Mulligan said.
Mulligan asked what would become of the older equipment. His brother informed him the system would simply be scrapped.
"He said they were just throwing it away. Nobody wanted it," Mulligan said. "They're going into very high tech, very modern stuff, things we're not ready for here."
But the Merrimack department had been unable to light any interest in the equipment, and so the perfectly functional dispatch center was headed for the scrap heap. Mulligan, who had never before brought up his dispatch center woes to his brother, asked how his own department could acquire the equipment.
"It's something we could use here," Mulligan said. "One man's trash is another man's treasure."
His brother formally went before the Merrimack Board of Selectmen, who voted in favor of handing over the equipment to Georgetown.
Before the transfer was made, a consultant from Randmark Communications checked the equipment out to tell Mulligan exactly what the department would be getting.
"We're getting a real treasure trove," the chief said.
This new dispatch center will allow for a second dispatcher's terminal and significantly expand the department's phone capabilities.
Cost-saving has been a top priority in all aspects of the transfer. Mulligan, Officer Derek Jones, and a team of volunteers from the Police and Fire departments made the hike up to New Hampshire to load it on to a truck - on loan from Georgetown's Light Department. Randmark staff dismantled it and will install it in the new station.
Had the department needed to replace the entire system, the cost would have been in the $100,000 range, Mulligan said. There was some available insurance money from the initial lightning storm damage, but it was not nearly enough to cover a new system.
"The cost of this new system is nothing to the town, because we literally got it as a free gift from Merrimack, and insurance money was used to bandage up the old system," Mulligan said.
But will anyone know how to use the new system? They will once the head dispatcher and an officer from the Merrimack Police Department stop by for a training seminar, another gift from Merrimack.
The new, expanded system will change the look of the communications center and bring a new level of technology and safety to the department and its constituents, the chief said.
"It was a godsend. It came at the perfect time," Mulligan said. "We had a need, and they had the item."
This article originally appeared in the Georgetown Record on Thursday, August 19, 2004 , by Matt Phillion/ Mphillio@Cnc.Com
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