Finance and audit committee approves lobbyist contract, 911 upgrades

The county’s finance and audit committee approved a $6,000 a-month lobbying contract with the Southern Group during its Tuesday, Nov. 15 meeting. At an earlier board of county commissioners meeting, commissioners ranked the Tallahassee-based lobbying firm as its first choice over long-time county lobbyist The Fiorentino Group.

Commissioner Mike Cella, who ranked The Southern Group as his first choice and The Fiorentino Group as second, said the decision was difficult.

“During the presentations, it became really obvious that although The Fiorentino Group and Joe Mobley: our lobbyist from Fiorentino, did a great job, The Southern Group had just something a little bit more in terms of moving forward, where The Fiorentino Group was going to do more of the same,” Cella said.

The commissioner added that he was impressed with The Southern Group’s deep bench and its ability to reach a large number of lawmakers on Clay County’s behalf.

The budget and finance committee, comprised of Commissioners Kristen Burke and Jim Renninger, also approved a $1.6 million, 60-month contract with AT&T to upgrade the county’s 911 system.

Dean Hane, the county’s management information services director, said the upgrade will improve reliability, resiliency and consistency on 911 calls.

“We need to be in a spot where our 911 call delivery and performance is top-notch,” he said. “We’re okay, we’re getting by today, but it’s an analog architecture. It’s old, and we sometimes have a lot of problems with call quality, depending on who is originating the call.”

Hane added that with an increasing population and call volumes, the county’s current analog system will be unable to keep pace.

Hane said the upgrades will also position the county to add next-generation 911 services, allowing callers to send photos and video to 911 operators.

“We get a lot more accuracy on locating callers,” he said of the next-generation services, so when we’re in search and rescue situations in these forests, that’s a big deal.”

The finance and audit committee screens upcoming expenditures, but the full county commission approves all spending.