The Navajo County Sheriff’s Office and the Navajo County Board of Supervisors have approved a contract with Mutualink Technology to implement an emergency alert and interoperability system within a number of school districts in Navajo County. Navajo County was selected by the Arizona State Legislature as one of four pilot counties in the state to receive preliminary funding for this program. The Navajo County Sheriff’s Office has chosen Mutualink to implement the Legislature’s School Safety Interoperability Program passed last year in response to the increase of school shootings. Mutualink’s cloud-based platform has two distinct advantages. First, it creates an interoperable, or across jurisdictions, system where law enforcement and school districts can work from the same communications platform. The interoperability will allow the first responders to work with and from the same information in real time. This application can also be expanded in the future to implement other first responders such as fire and EMS and other private community partners. The second is that it gives school administrators the ability to instantly share live video, voice, pictures, emergency plans, and floor plans with law enforcement. School administrators need a way to communicate with dispatchers and first responders quickly because of the ever-changing nature of emergency situations, making real-time information critical. NCSO will be partnering with the following school districts and law enforcement agencies to begin this pilot program: Winslow, Joseph City and Snowflake School District unified school districts, as well as Holbrook, Winslow Police and Snowflake/Taylor police departments. Others include: Show Low and Mogollon unified school districts, Sequoia Schools, and Show Low, Pinetop/Lakeside and White Mountain Apache police departments. Navajo County Sheriff David Clouse said, “In rural counties like ours, we often have to work with different agencies. When Mutualink is used, other agencies will automatically get the same alert to start heading to the emergency. We support each other very well, especially when responding to these critical incidents. Getting that information out is critical. If this could save us a minute or two, that’s even better.”
