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Carroll County approves $4,820 door-access expansion, tables full elevator upgrade pending more quotes
Summary
The Carroll County board voted to add badge readers to three doors for $4,820 and deferred a larger elevator-access upgrade after members raised cost and long-term planning concerns; staff recounted recent security incidents in the communications center that prompted the request.
The Carroll County board voted to approve a $4,820 contract to add badge-access equipment to three doors — serving the juvenile court office, the communications center and the server room — and agreed to seek additional cost estimates before moving forward with a larger elevator integration.
The measure to expand the door system passed after brief debate over price and contractor continuity; one board member said the per-door equipment costs roughly matched earlier work and that staying with the original installer made practical sense. "We have a quote for $4,820," one presenter said while explaining the three doors had been an afterthought to the original installation.
Board members raised concern over a separate quote from the county's elevator contractor to run cable and ready the elevator for badge control, a proposal that was discussed as costing about $10,000 to $11,000 for initial cable work. Several members reacted with "sticker shock," noting that building a physical wall or reconfiguring the basement access might offer a lower-cost or longer-term solution once finish work and doors were included.
Jason, the county communications director, described recent safety incidents in the courthouse basement and communications center that staff say motivated the request. He said a person who had spent time in the county jail had been in the basement after release and that, during another event, someone entered while doors were propped for maintenance. "She felt very uncomfortable in that situation," Jason said of a lone female dispatcher who encountered one visitor.
Rather than commit to the elevator contractor's work immediately, the board agreed to table any final decision on full elevator integration. Members asked staff to gather multiple bids for an interior wall, for external-elevator options and for the elevator-cable work so the board could weigh a coordinated remodel or phased fixes against an immediate installation. Speaker 2 volunteered to lead site visits with Dalton and Jason to gather estimates and bring options back to the board.
The board's next step is to collect the requested quotes and return the item to a future agenda; no binding contract for the elevator upgrade was authorized at the meeting.
