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City agrees to pay dispatcher

By JOHN THOMPSON
jthompson@TheCitizenNews.com

A dispute that has lasted a decade may finally be coming to an end.

The city of Senoia has notified Coweta County that it will pay for one-third of a dispatcher’s salary to run the city’s administrative call’s to the county’s 911 service.

For years, Coweta’s smaller towns have been using the county’s 911 service to run tags and call for back-up vehicles, in addition to real emergency calls.

Last November, the county gave Senoia and Grantville a two month deadline to set up another system to handle administrative calls, but that deadline passed.

County Commission Chairman Vernon “Mutt” Hunter and the other commissioners voted unanimously early this year for the two cities to present a solution, or face being cut off the system.

The debate started several years ago when the county informed Senoia and Grantville they could no longer handle administrative calls, such as tag checks, because the call center was being overrun by non-emergency calls.

The city of Senoia looked at options, such as starting its own call center, but found the costs prohibitive and Grantville took the county to court over the issue.

But late last week, Senoia agreed to help pay for the cost of a new dispatcher.

“We’ve never really had a problem with Senoia. We just wanted this issue resolved,” said County Administrator Theron Gay.

Gay thinks the city has made the right decision.

“I don’t think there’s a cheaper way to do this,” he said.