Public safety workers in the City of Ozark and in Christian County should have a new communication system soon. In their regular monthly meeting Monday night, the Ozark Board of Alderman voted to participate in an intergovernmental agency with Christian County Emergency Services and other cities in the county to help fund and move along a project to update their radio system. The new system will integrate with the Statewide Interoperability Network, a system providing statewide radio communication.
During the meeting, Ozark Chief of Police Justin Arnold described the project as a once in a lifetime opportunity to make upgrades that will have a generational impact. Arnold described the current radio system the city uses as designed for a large theme park, not a rapidly developing city, and explained that the system does not allow them to communicate outside of the county — with Springfield for instance.
The over $9 million project has been mostly funded by the federal government, Arnold said, and the intergovernmental agency plans to distribute the $1.8 million remaining costs across the partner organizations. He said they anticipated Ozark’s cost would be approximately $237,000.