County acquires 15 acre site for public safety building

About 15 acres in New Milford Township was signed over to the county last week as plans to construct a new public safety building on the site move forward.

“We’re pretty excited,” said Commissioner Alan Hall. “It’s a project we’ve worked on for years and it’s now coming to fruition.”

Having site control will open up more grant opportunities for the project, Hall said. The county has already received $500,000 in state RACP funding. The facility is expected to cost about $10 million to complete.

The public safety building would house the county’s 911 and public safety departments, as well as provide space for the New Milford district magistrate’s office, and provide a centralize training area for local emergency services.

Rough designs for the facility have been completed, and finished designs can now be completed before being finalized to go to engineering and then put out to bid.

“This is probably the most important thing the county can do right now,” Hall said, noting the existing 911 center and emergency operations center in the county office building do not meet requirements because of their location and size, as well as tower issues. Equipment being used currently is obsolete, said the commissioner.

“The new facility will have the newest technology so 911 and the EOC will be able to get through the next 35-50 years,” Hall said, emphasizing the importance of a department that serves everyone in the county “from cradle to grave.”

The new facility will also provide for continuity of county government in the event something happened at the Montrose facilities.  The location is critical, Hall said. The facility will be located near the Pennsylvania State Police barracks in New Miflord Twp. The access to the Interstate 81 corridor will allow for the county to get people there and “take care of what we need to” during critical situations. “It’s also far enough away from the Courthouse so that if that building is affected, this one will not be affected also.”

Hall also said the new location for the Central Magisterial District in the proposed facility can also serve as a backup for the President Judge to use. The facility will also house the coroner’s office.

The commissioners plan to use the facility to offer educational programs for EMTs and firefighters in an effort to centralize trainings in the county. “That could help us get grants so the fire companies and ambulance services don’t have such a huge burden,” Hall said.

And in the event of a natural disaster hitting the county, there would  be “room to take care of people as they should be and provide them service,” Hall added.

The land was deeded over to the county by Singh Realty’s Andy Aulakh. Hall thanked the Aulakh family for “basically donating the land to help the taxpayers and residents of the county.”

The land deal was completed after the commissioners met last week for the regular county business meeting.

Few items were on the agenda for the March 13 meeting. The commissioners did, however, hear from Forest City Mayor Christopher Glinton.

Glinton offered an update on projects happening in the borough and businesses opening on Main Street and offered up his thanks to the commissioners and the county’s economic development board for helping businesses in the borough.

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