Senoia

residents learned Monday night it may soon cost the city

nearly $100,000 for radio dispatch service for the city's

police officers to use.

The city

recently learned Coweta County would no longer supply

service for free and the city would have to find an

alternative for the police force to phone in field

reports.

"With

the increase in calls, the county is saying they would

have to hire at least five more employees," said

Police Chief Ben Thomas.

It's not

emergency phone calls to the county emergency 911 system

that are the problem, Thomas said. It's all the radio

calls generated from the officers, such as running tags

and plugging into the GCIC computer, he said.

The city is

left with two options. It can either contract with the

county to provide the services or start up its own

dispatch system, he added.

The county

was originally scheduled to stop the service in July, but

Mayor Joan Trammell said the city now has until January

to figure out a solution.

Starting

its own system might make sense, since the city could

rotate officers to man the radio, but Trammell said a

costly computer is needed to tie into the main system at

the state level.

"The

CAD system costs $150,000. This is not something we were

anticipating," she said.

Councilman

Robert Hannah asked if the city could possibly contract

with the city of Newnan to provide the service, but

Thomas said that is not feasible.

"They're

on a different frequency. It would cause too many

problems switching between frequencies for regular calls

and getting other information," he said.

Trammell

asked the council to evaluate the problem and be ready to

come to a solution before the end of the year.

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