Westmoreland County has returned nearly 75% of a federal grant meant to pay for mobile backups of the county’s 911 dispatch system.
Officials said bookkeeping errors impacted the $529,000 project to purchase the mobile 911 dispatch units. Those units could be relocated if public safety services were forced to evacuate from the Hempfield operations center.
Meghan McCandless, the county’s director of financial administration, confirmed that more than $339,000 of unspent grant money was returned to the U.S. Justice Department, which furnished the funds in 2022. The unspent portion of the grant can be reapplied for and returned to the county, she said.
Public Safety Director Roland Mertz said the county erroneously believed it could draw from the funds to pay the bills as the project continued, but later determined that process did not meet the government’s requirements for how the money could be spent.
“We are going to finish it. The project is not 100% complete and we were waiting for the invoices to pay the bill. We will seek an extension to have the money returned,” Mertz said. “This is not a forfeiture. This is a process and we will get the money back.”
Grant funds were earmarked to purchase five backup 911 dispatch consoles that can be moved to alternate locations if the county’s brick and mortar center in Hempfield had to be relocated due to an emergency or technical failure.
Each mobile unit features a weatherproof crate that holds a fold-out table, three to five laptop computers and communications equipment used by operators to take emergency calls and dispatch police, fire or ambulance crews.
The county operates the emergency center with 22 permanent stations for dispatchers and call takers. The center typically is staffed with about 10 employees on each shift. It operates 24 hours a day and receives an average of about 900 calls daily.
Two of the portable 911 dispatch consoles have been purchased and can be deployed if necessary, Mertz said.
“It is something we really need based on our continuity of operation plan,” Mertz said.
