Lyon County briefs

Lyon County will get an emergency operations center only if it is fully funded by grant money.

County emergency management director Jeff Page told the commissioners that the strategic plan they were being asked to approve would include an emergency operations center as part of the five-year plan. He said the county was combining programs to get in compliance with federal and state standards.

Page said the grants come from U.S. Department of Homeland Security funds designed to aid communities that have little or no emergency services.

Commission Chairman Don Tibbals asked that any approval stipulate that it would be 100 percent financed by grants. It was approved contingent on funds coming from outside the county.

Lyon County is no longer interested in a 40-acre lot owned by the Bureau of Land Management, and will send a letter withdrawing a request for the land in Silver Springs.

County Manager Dennis Stark said that the land, formerly intended for use by the animal control division, was no longer of interest to the county, which cannot afford to expand animal services.

He said the Lyon County School District was interested in obtaining the land.

Lyon County commissioners became the first of four counties to approve a multi-county ethernet microwave agreement that would improve emergency communications for Lyon, Storey, Douglas counties and Carson City as well as several Indian communities in Reno and Schurz.

Jeff Page, county emergency management director, said that three years ago the four counties worked on an interlocal agreement to interconnect for IT, GIS and communication infrastructure that would improve emergency communications in case of a disaster and also provide the backbone infrastructure for broadcasting public service programs, including the commission meetings.

He said funding for the agreement and the infrastructure, which will be special towers on mountain tops around the area, was approved by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

The funding requires $65,000 from each county, which can be provided through in-kind contributions from Page and his staff. Page said the system would replace the county's repeater system on the mountain tops.

The Lyon County Commission agreed to pay Hannafin and Associates $9,500 for an architectural review of the historic Bluestone Building in Dayton, which houses the Dayton justice court.

Justice of the Peace Bill Rogers told the court the building's design was inadequate, even after the sheriff's department moved out last year, for the court's needs.

He said the court had no way to separate juries, defendants and victims or witnesses as required by state law, and storage space was needed.

He told the commissioners even if a public safety complex was eventually built in Dayton or Silver Springs, and the court moved, the Bluestone should be kept and used for other county offices needed for space.