Vision for Manatee County includes clean water, faster EMS responses

One of Charlie Bishop’s first requests as the new acting county administrator was to have the staff create a future vision for Manatee County.

When residents were recently asked to describe their future vision of the county in one word, many responded with the word “congested.” 

But traffic jams aren’t just annoying, they can slow down Emergency Medical Service response times, so the staff set a goal to speed up those times.

Average response times stayed steady under eight minutes, and often under seven minutes, from 2012 through the end of 2021. Since then, the average time has crept up to over eight minutes.

There are plans already in place within the CIP to update the 911 call routing system, the Computer Aided Dispatch System (CAD) and the station alerting system. 

The county’s current 911 call routing system is as outdated as a rotary phone because it only accepts calls. The new system, which will be implemented by the end of the year at a cost of $4 million, can keep up with smartphones and accept digital data, such as text messages, photographs and videos.

The CAD is the system that dispatchers use to prioritize and manage the information and responses to incoming emergency calls. The software will be updated and the hardware will be replaced by the end of the year and cost $1.4 million. This is done every 3 to 5 years to improve efficiency and prevent system failure. 

The current station alerting system is also outdated. It will be replaced with a new system by the end of next year, which will include advanced alerting capabilities and emergency dispatch automation by connecting to the CAD. Devices need to be installed at each of the 17 Manatee County EMS stations. The estimated cost is $40,000 per station with a total cost of $680,000.  

What’s included in the vision but not in the CIP is the use of artificial intelligence. While the County’s Information Outreach Manager Bill Logan stressed that the plans to use AI are theoretical and might not come to fruition, the staff sees potential in the technology.  

“It is our understanding that the AI can collate and make building CAD information more easily and quickly accessible to first responders to enable them to make entry to multi-unit facilities or buildings and get to where they need to be more efficiently,” Logan said. “Also, there is hope that integrated traffic signals could be coordinated to make first responders a priority through potentially clogged intersections.”

How AI prioritizes is by preemptively giving green lights as emergency vehicles are in route, so the traffic is cleared when they arrive at the intersection. 

Another major goal that is of importance to citizens across the county is clean drinking water. One project, in particular, aims to keep Manatee’s water quality more consistent: An overhaul of the filtration systems at Lake Manatee.

The conventional surface water treatment that’s used now is being replaced with a low-pressure membrane filtration system. 

“The benefit of a membrane filtration versus media filters is that the defined pore size is a consistent particle barrier. Particles larger than the pore size cannot get through the membrane and cannot make it to the filtered water stream,” Logan said. “Particles can allow harmful pathogens and viruses to be shielded from disinfection during treatment. The ultrafiltration membranes will guarantee a filtered water turbidity (number of particles in the water) well below regulated levels without as much operator interaction and maintenance as needed now.”

The approximately 5-minute video, starring all seven commissioners, was played during the land use meeting on Sept. 28 and can be viewed on the Manatee Board of County Commissioners YouTube channel.