Muldraugh City Council debates readdressing for E-911 By KAREN KENNEDY The Muldraugh City Council held an Enhanced 911 workshop on May 11. Attending this workshop were Mayor Danny Tate and councilmen Curtis Kelley, Ron Heschke, Donnie Basham, and Irvin Davis. 911 director Mark Bennett and E-911 consultant Bill Lacey attended the meeting to provide council with information and to answer questions. Bennett and Lacey explained how the readdressing process works and how it works hand in hand with the new technology that Meade County is in the process of installing and implementing. The National Standard Addressing System, which is used in surrounding counties and other parts of the United States, is the system being used for Meade County’s readdressing. This metered system calculates new addresses every 5.28 feet, allowing for 1,000 address points per linear mile. It also creates room for future building expansion. This addressing system provides a progression of addresses in ascending and descending order, with odd and even addresses on opposite sides of the road. Currently, Muldraugh is using a grid system form of addressing. Addresses were changed in Muldraugh back in 1995, and Mayor Tate said at that time they were told that was the end of it. He questioned whether new addresses would be the final addresses. Bennett and Lacey said this should be the end of readdressing. Tate said he’s been receiving many phone calls from Muldraugh citizens who have a lot of questions and concerns about the possible readdressing. He asked Bennett and Lacey numerous questions so he would be able to answer questions asked of him by the citizens of the city. But there was one question that seemed most important. “Would you explain why our current addressing system won’t work with the new technology?” asked Tate. This same topic kept resurfacing in the council room throughout the entire meeting. In a nutshell, Bennett and Lacey explained how Muldraugh’s current addressing system won’t work as well with Meade County’s Phase One and Phase Two technology upgrades as the new addressing system will work. They could make it work with Phase One technology, but it just won’t work well once Meade County gets to Phase Two. Down the road, they said, Muldraugh might need to make some adjustments to their addressing if they don’t choose to do it now. Mayor Tate wondered if it might be better to just go ahead and make the address changes now instead of realizing down the road that the changes are necessary. Tate’s concern is that the city could be left with considerable expense making the changes later on. Right now, there is no cost to the city for the readdressing other than possibly changing the names on some street signs. Probably the biggest concern Bennett and Lacey have is that if Muldraugh chooses not to readdress the city, emergency response personnel might not be as quick and effective as it could be under the new addressing system. “We can’t guarantee accurate response of emergency services. It’s like putting duct tape on something,” said Lacey. “This is life-saving technology, which is the whole reason we’re doing this.” “Whether or not you decide to readdress the city now or later is up to you,” said Bennett. “But it might be better to tackle the whole thing now.” A handful of people attended the meeting to offer comments and ask a number of questions. Former city mayor John Carlberg said he was dumfounded about the address changes, noting how someone used a GPS system to drive from downtown Louisville to his house with total accuracy. Muldraugh’s postmaster Larry Figg and interim postmaster Nancy Casey also attended the meeting. Figg doesn’t quite understand why such changes are necessary and stated his rationale for leaving things as they currently stand. Councilman Heschke said it would be hard for the fire department to get used to new street names and building numbers. E-911 has recommended several street name changes where there is already another street in the county with the same name or else there are two streets with phonetically similar names. Tate worried that if Muldraugh doesn’t take this opportunity now, financial support from the county for a future address change might not be available down the road. “We’d have to hope that the county would work with us later on this,” said Tate. “To get Fiscal Court to come to Muldraugh and get something done can sometimes be like pulling bear’s teeth. Maybe we could do it [readdressing] now, get it done, and make it work.” “We’re giving you the best option we can give you for now and the future,” said Lacey, “We’re offering you the same technology we’re offering the rest of the county. It’s not our way or the highway. It’s entirely up to the city government.” Lacey’s words were affirmed by Mark Bennett. “All we’re doing is recommending.” By the end of the meeting, there was no decision made since this was only a workshop and no voting was permitted to take place. The mayor and council are basically still in the process of digesting all the information and considering the repercussions of both choices before any decision can be made. Click Here to Go Back
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