WRVEC approves $2,300 grant to Gainesville VFD for new radios

During the Gainesville City Council meeting, Clerk Lisa Goodnight informed the council that White River Valley Electric Cooperative awarded the Gainesville Volunteer Fire Department a $2,338.08 “Plugged In” grant for new vehicle fire department radios.

Gainesville Fire Chief Ed Doiron told the Times that the new radios purchased with the WRVEC funds include four truck radios, which will work cooperatively with the six handheld individual radios and one truck radio the county purchased for GVFD last summer as part of a county-wide communications upgrade. Doiron said the addition of the new truck radios, along with one he purchased personally, will allow all of the fire trucks and the chief’s truck to be outfitted with a radio.

The Ozark County Commissioners approved a more than $265,000 bid by Radio Communications Specialists of Springfield last July to upgrade the communication systems of the Ozark County Sheriff’s office and all of Ozark County’s volunteer fire departments. Of that amount, more than $66,000 was used to purchase 72 portable radios including 12 in-vehicle radios with repeaters that were dispersed to all of Ozark County’s volunteer fire departments. 

Before the upgrade, volunteer firefighters and deputies many times were unable to receive radio messages from the dispatch office or between each other.