Town to buy new equipment

JACKSON - The Township Council was expected to amend a 2001 bond ordinance at its meeting on July 10 and use the remaining funds for a variety of items.

The amended ordinance provides for the acquisition and installation of an emergency generator, an emergency communication system and a communication tower for the emergency management department which is to be located in the Justice Complex, West Veterans Highway.

The ordinance also provides for the acquisition and installation of a photocopier for the police department, the acquisition and installation of a roll-off truck with a plow, a 30-cubic-yard compactor truck with a plow, a roadside mower, a leaf vacuum machine and a transfer station compactor for the Public Works Department.

Also provided for in the amended ordinance will be the acquisition of a handicap accessible bus for the transportation of senior citizens and the refurbishment of two emergency medical transport vehicles.

Council President Ann Updegrave said, "One of the things Mayor Mark Seda did when he got elected (in May 2006) was to take inventory. [He looked at] where we needed to upgrade or better implement, within departments, things that were not advanced. We needed to go forward."

Updegrave said the public safety and public works departments needed upgraded equipment.

"We [also] needed to increase and better our services medically," she said. "That also holds true for emergency management. We have to be able to address emergencies as they come up."

The total appropriation for the items in the amended ordinance will be $4.98 million. The total debt authorization will be $4.5 million and the total down payment will be $451,661, with $190,000 coming from grant funds received from the Department of a Transportation.

Officials said $35,000 in grant funding is expected to be received from a Community Development Block Grant and $226,661 will come from the Capital Improvement Fund.

- Dave Benjamin