Okanogan County Voters Will Decide on Prop 2 for Emergency Radio Systems

Ballots will be in mailboxes in about three weeks and Okanogan County voters will be deciding upon a two-tenths of one percent sales tax for upgrades to the emergency communications radio system.

Sheriff's Office Chief Deputy of Special Operations and Communications Mike Worden says their current equipment is no longer in production and support ends next year.

"The age is only one problem. The other problem is, largely throughout the county there is only one channel for all law, all fire and all EMS responders to talk on. That's a capacity problem and when there's more than one incident or one large incident, there's only so much communicating and coordinating that can happen."

That can lead to people talking over each other.

Worden says this is an important measure for them.

"The long-term goal is to improve the system used by first responders and put us on a more sustainable path. The problem we have today is that we have old equipment. We've not been able to set funds aside to replace that equipment in a controlled fashion. So we're in this amped-up emergency condition because there's not funding easily available to go ahead and take care of that."

More information on the proposition can be found at OKCOEC.com.