The Jackson County Sheriff's Department has a new tool to respond to emergency situations.
The county's Board of Commissioners recently approved the purchase of a Special Response Trailer for the sheriff's office.
Captain Mike O'Leary says it will be a 28-foot long mobile command center that resembles a racecar trailer. He says the frequency of natural disasters in the county was the impetus for purchasing it.
"We have found that it would have been helpful to have this trailer available to us to set up at a remote location. In fact, we had used one provided by the state during a couple of our floods over the last decade or so. They proved to be very useful in accomplishing what we needed to do."
O'leary says it's useful even beyond traditional response circumstances.
"When we had the derecho in 2009, we had one of the state trailers that we were able to use for a few days. Since there was no power to the courthouse, we actually moved some of our government operations from the courthouse into the trailer. Payroll and essential services that needed to continue, they were able to, on a limited basis, use that trailer to fulfill some of those obligations."
O'Leary says the mobile trailer could also be used by the public to charge electronic devices in the event of a widespread, long-term power outage like the derecho.
O'Leary says the 38-thousand-dollar trailer will feature a generator, radio communications equipment, and carport. He hopes the custom-made unit will be operational in about two months.
