The North Greece Fire District’s emergency dispatch center signed off for the last time this morning…a victim of rising equipment and operating costs.
Emergency services will now be dispatched by the Monroe County 911 Center.
North Greece was almost alone in continuing to dispatch its own fire and EMS services after the 911 system was established. The dispatch center on Latta Road expanded, taking on calls for Barnard and Lakeshore Fire Districts plus Greece Volunteer Ambulance 24/seven. They handled some 12,000 emergency calls a year and served as the town’s emergency communications center.
North Greece Commissioners say they’ve had to invest more than $100,000 since 2011 to upgrade equipment and software, and were looking at another $100,000 as the rest of the county modernized its systems. Operating costs were topping $600,000 a year.
The commissioners made the decision last fall to shut down on June first and allocate the funds to other areas of the fire service.
The dispatchers prided themselves on local knowledge and a history going back 94 years to when a volunteer would sound the fire siren and write the address on a blackboard for the arriving volunteer firefighters to read.