MODESTO — The Stanislaus County Board of Supervisors and Sheriff Jeff Dirkse struck a compromise last week, with each side getting to move ahead with their preferred computer-aided dispatch systems.

The supervisors had backed the CentralSquare CAD system that is favored by the city of Modesto’s police and fire departments and hoped to keep all parties within the Stanislaus Regional 911 dispatch center — under a Joint Powers Authority agreement. Meanwhile, Dirkse has been keen on breaking away and teaming with the city of Ceres’ call center to utilize a product designed by software giant Oracle, which offers integrated records-management and jail-management systems to go along with its CAD system.

The supervisors voted 5-0 to move ahead with CentralSquare while freeing Dirkse to partner with Oracle, a deal that seems to sidestep a potential courtroom showdown between the board and Dirkse. 

“I think there’s a compromise here where it’s a win-win for all parties involved,” said District 5 Supervisor Channce Condit. “And that is simply keeping the JPA together, probably adding some simple modifications along the way, and keeping everybody in the same building, but allowing the sheriff to operate Oracle within that building.”

Dirkse seemed to agree with that assessment and said he believes utilizing a CAD-to-CAD arrangement can be done without any negative impact to Modesto’s emergency services.

“Functionally, they get to do exactly what it is that they’ve wanted to do, and that’s go to CentralSquare; and I’ve stood right here and said that I support that,” Dirkse told the board. “There is still some work that needs to be done, I fully acknowledge that… But I think it can get us where we need to be, at significant savings to our county and increased efficiency to the sheriff’s office.”

Dirkse’s contention has been that his department requires RMS and JMS components, something not every public-safety agency requires. Oracle sought an agency with which to collaborate as it seeks to break into the California market for public-safety software.

Test runs of the Oracle product were met with less than an enthusiastic response from SR911 personnel, but Dirkse and his staff countered that SR911 dispatches test drove a stripped-down model of the product not ready for prime time.

Now that the dispute has been hammered out, both CentralSquare and Oracle need to be ready to go live by Sept. 15.

“The timing component is going to be so important,” said District 2 Supervisor Vito Chiesa, who represents Hughson and Turlock. “In emails with Modesto, they’re concerned about the timing of getting CentralSquare implemented, and that’s Sept. 15.”

Dirkse said he didn’t anticipate the deadline being a problem for Oracle.

District 3 Supervisor Terry Withrow was concerned that the stalemate, which he said resulted in heated exchanges behind closed doors, had caused bad blood.

“In the 15 years I’ve been doing this, I’ve never gone through something like this,” said Withrow. “There’s been some damage done to relationships as a result of this whole thing, and I think there definitely needs to be some efforts to repair some things here, because it’s just not the way we operate in this county.”

Guidelines set forth by the California State Association of Counties indicate that sheriffs enforce laws under the supervision of the state attorney general, and while sheriffs are obligated to follow budgetary guidelines set forth by supervisors, boards cannot interfere with a sheriff’s investigative or prosecutorial procedures. By forcing him to use CentralSquare, Dirkse felt the board was doing precisely that, and he said legal action was a possibility.

But that all seems to be in the past.

“For the last two weeks or so, we’ve had discussions around this alternative model with keeping the JPA together and what that would look like,” said Dirkse. “I think that this is the happiest medium, if you will, that will allow us to accomplish all these tasks together.

“I’ve heard that board’s overwhelming interest is in keeping the JPA together, because of the impact on response times. And through this CAD-to-CAD solution, which I have extreme confidence will work, I believe we can absolutely do that.”