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DeKalb HERPS committee approves slate of public-safety contracts and renewals
Summary
The DeKalb County HERPS committee approved multiple contract renewals and purchases covering police overtime for FIFA events, surveillance detection gear, vehicle biohazard cleaning, aviation fuel for helicopters, ammunition, medical screenings for firefighters and vehicle decals as part of broader public-safety and facilities planning.
DeKalb County’s HERPS committee on Tuesday approved a bundle of public-safety contract renewals and purchases ranging from overtime funding for anticipated FIFA World Cup events to surveillance detection equipment and medical screening services for fire-rescue personnel.
The committee, chaired by Ladina Bolton, advanced the items by voice vote after staff described each request and answered commissioners’ questions. An assistant chief told the committee the FIFA-related award is intended to cover overtime for officers across the Atlanta metro area and administrative overtime tied to designated FIFA events, and that certain equipment purchased for the event "will be able to be used outside of FIFA once FIFA is over," according to the transcript. The exact dollar amount for that grant line was garbled in the meeting transcript and was not clearly stated on the record at the meeting.
The committee also approved a sole-source purchase of surveillance-detection equipment to allow select police personnel to conduct targeted sweeps at county facilities. "This agenda item is for a sole source purchase for surveillance detection equipment... used by select police personnel to conduct bug sweeps," Major Ferrer of the DeKalb County Police said during the meeting.
Other approved items included: a second renewal for biohazard cleaning, sanitizing and disinfecting police vehicles; a first renewal for aviation fuel to support the county’s police helicopters as staffing and flight time increase; a change order increasing funds for guns, ammunition and accessories used by police and the marshal’s office; a soils- and materials-testing change order tied to fencing and surveying for a firing range; an annual renewal for occupational medical and cancer-screening services for fire-rescue personnel; and a contract increase for vehicle vinyl decals to serve a growing fleet.
On the construction side, the committee approved a recommendation to award construction of three new fire stations to Cooper & Company General Constructors, Inc., with staff citing a combined contract amount listed in the meeting materials as approximately $26.588 million and saying individual stations came in at roughly $7 million apiece with contingency allowances. Director Butler confirmed the awards had been reviewed by audit and staff corrected typographical items in a substitute document prior to the vote.
Committee members asked routine implementation questions — for example, whether equipment bought for FIFA would need to be returned (staff said it would not) and how many helicopters were in the fleet (staff said two would be operational once maintenance is complete). Motions for each item were made and seconded; no roll-call tallies were recorded in the public spoken record.
The committee chair closed the section of the agenda by congratulating department staff and moving the meeting on to other items.
What’s next: These approvals move the contracts forward for implementation under existing procurement procedures; the committee did not identify outstanding obstacles to executing the awarded agreements during the session.
