KINGWOOD — The takeaway from a Preston County Commission work session to discuss the county’s vehicle fleet is it’s time to start thinking about and planning for the future.
“I think initially, it was because we were in desperate need,” County Administrator Kathy Mace said. “Our fleet was so old, and we were trying to put law enforcement in safer, newer (vehicles). And that’s the only way we could achieve that was to enter into lease agreements.”
Almost all 14 vehicles leased by the county from Enterprise Rent-A-Car are used by the sheriff’s office.
“In my opinion that didn’t play out like we had hoped,” Commissioner Dave Price said.
Duane Hamilton, director of Preston County Office of Emergency Management / 911 said, “I can tell you I’ve had a lot of conversations and a lot of people are in the same boat you’re in. And I can tell you where they’re headed is out of it.”
Hamilton said he started looking for alternatives to the lease agreement after finding out the county was upside down on a vehicle they had to pay off because it was totaled.
“I found it very upsetting when I took this over a little over a year ago that we had a police cruiser that got totaled by a side by side that hit him, and when we went to the pay the vehicle off we were upside down on it. That kinda really didn’t sit well with me,” Hamilton said.
Prior to the work session, the commission approved the purchase of a new police cruiser for the sheriff’s office using CARES funding. Hamilton has asked the commission to buy three cruisers using CARES money.
However, Samantha Stone noted that money is a one time thing and in the coming budget discussions the commission needs to starting thinking about including money for vehicles.
However, three vehicles is three steps in the right direction, Hamilton said.
The county has the option to buy vehicles when leases expire, however Hamilton said he doesn’t see that happening with cruisers. Sheriff Paul “Moe” Pritt said, in his opinion, the cruisers were pretty much done at the end of the lease period.
Another expense is the “upfitting” of each vehicle, which has increased from $15,000-$18,000 to almost $30,000, Mace said. The upfit includes installing radios, cages and other needed police equipment, Hamilton said.
The commission also discussed ways to get more money from their used vehicles such as selling already upfit cruisers to small police departments that wouldn’t need to put many miles on them.
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