BROOKHAVEN — Lincoln County’s joint E-911 center will start work the first of August if there are no more changes from the Attorney General’s office. Chris Reid, Director of the Lincoln County Emergency Management Agency, said they need to move forward with hiring during the regularly scheduled Board of Supervisors meeting Monday morning. 

“We don’t need to wait until the last minute. It will put us in a bind,” Reid said. “We interviewed candidates a long time ago thinking it would go through. I’m afraid we would have to do more looking.”

Lincoln County’s Board of Supervisors agreed and voted to approve Reid’s request to hire and train dispatchers before the joint E-911 opens.

The interlocal agreement should be approved by the Attorney General’s office by July 29th and would go into effect on August 1. 

At the June 19 meeting, Reid asked the supervisors if they could approve a $625 per month to add the Brookhaven Police Departments Computer Aided Dispatch module to their system in E911. He said they already have the module for the sheriff’s department and fire departments. 

District 4 Supervisor Eddie Brown asked Reid to go to the Brookhaven Board of Aldermen and ask them to take on the cost of adding the police module. Reid was unable to get to the Aldermen meeting to make the request but said he spoke to Mayor Joe Cox about the funding.

Reid said Cox told him he did not think it would be a problem for the city to pay for the police module. Brookhaven’s Board of Aldermen meet tonight at 6:30 p.m. in the Lincoln County Courthouse and the issue could come up there.