Allen County’s courthouse will be closed to the public until Thursday morning as a response to the possibility of utility blackouts.
Commissioners voted to shutter the doors at Tuesday’s regular commission meeting.
Offices will continue to operate at the discretion of department heads, however, and so may be available by phone.
Jason Trego, emergency management director, gave a report to commissioners on the weather situation and talked about measures their office was taking in response.
He said he’d recently met with the National Weather Service in preparation for extreme temperatures, as well as record usage of utilities.
Trego discussed the Southwest Power Pool’s decision to move to Level Three conservation measures, including blackouts, and explained that any decision to enact a blackout does not rest with Allen County.
The center had received a number of “very angry” calls by residents who did not realize that local authorities do not control which portions of the grid are deactivated at a given time to prevent “a catastrophic failure of the system.”
“If they cut out power, they cut out power,” Trego noted. “We can only try to plan for it.”
Trego also said he’d been provided no specific blackout locations, along with receiving conflicting times for how long blackouts might last (anywhere from 30 minutes to two hours). Regarding specifics, he said Evergy had been “pretty tight-lipped.”
Trego and others had also been in communication with the hospital, nursing homes and other critical infrastructure, checking on the availability of generators, alternative housing plans for keeping people warm and more.
Allen County’s Emergency Response Center also assisted Anderson County when their systems were down for two full days. Agreements exist between counties to prepare for emergency situations.
All told, despite the weather, the number of local 911 calls has not been abnormally high, and few accidents have been reported thus far.
Apart from weather, Trego, along with 911 director Chelsie Angleton, presented commissioners with bids for refurbished laptops and again appealed to hire an additional dispatcher to serve in a “floating” or “swing” capacity.
Commissioners approved a bid to purchase four refurbished toughbooks from Amazon for a total of $2,260.
They also heartily approved the 911 center making its desired hire, as it is estimated to save the county $24,612 per year in overtime costs.
