MODESTO — Stanislaus Regional 911 executive director Kasey Young made her pitch to the Stanislaus Board of Supervisors on Tuesday, hoping to keep SR911 joint powers authority intact and using the CentralSquare computer-aided dispatch system.

Sheriff Jeff Dirkse, unhappy with the prospect of having to use the CentralSquare CAD system, is seeking to break away from SR911 and enter into a dispatch partnership with Ceres police, using a suite of products created by software giant Oracle.

SR911 handles dispatch duties for the sheriff’s department, Modesto police and fire, Turlock fire and for county fire districts. Turlock police handles its own dispatch duties.

Last week, the sheriff and his team delivered a 75-minute presentation to the board that was followed by two hours of back-and-forth with the supervisors.

Young spoke to the board Tuesday for nearly 30 minutes, which was followed by more than an hour of comment from the public and the supervisors. Her presentation highlighted the stressors that would be placed upon SR911 if it were forced to move away from the CentralSquare product, which she sees as the best fit for all emergency services in the region.

“SR911 handles 600,000 calls per year — ingoing and outgoing — and about 90 to 100 calls an hour during our busiest time,” said Young, who joined SR911 in September 2022. “For all three disciplines — that’s law, fire, and EMS — CentralSquare offers everybody the best solution.”

Young pointed out that if the sheriff’s department pulled out of SR911, calls made to a Ceres hub would require additional transfers, resulting in increased call times, when dealing with fire and EMS incidents.

Dirkse disavowed that notion.

“While call transfer time and call processing time are not insignificant factors in this conversation, it’s response time that is the major component of any critical incident,” the sheriff said. “I would submit that the current call processing time, whether it’s with SR911 or Ceres, does not significantly change our response time to show up an actually handle a critical incident.”

The county’s dalliance with Oracle began in 2021, when Modesto’s police and fire departments expressed a desire to leave SR911. Those feuding agencies have since reconciled, and last summer the Consolidated Emergency Dispatch Agency Commission approved the implementation of CentralSquare.

“This has been an ongoing debate before I got here,” said Young. “We needed a CAD before I arrived.”

In addition to a CAD, Dirkse’s department needs records- and jail-management systems, something Oracle offers in its suite of products. Dirkse also showed that partnering with Oracle could potentially save the county almost $12 million.

Young said that CentralSquare also provides RMS and JMS options, though those products are not utilized by the SR911.

The conflicting presentations leave the supervisors in a difficult position: they can bend to the will of the sheriff and alienate the county’s largest city, or deny the sheriff his preferred choice and face potential litigation.

In a Nov. 8 letter to the board, Dirkse questioned the board’s authority to “interfere with the independent and constitutionally and statutorily designated investigative functions,” which he believes includes the implementation of his desired CAD, RMS, and JMS systems. He has hinted that litigation is an option.

The saga took a dramatic turn on Jan. 24 when Dirkse’s office executed a search warrant on the SR911 offices in Modesto.

Both Dirkse and Young declined to elaborate on the reasons for it, since the investigation remains ongoing.

“We really need to sit down and get some more information,” said District 2 Supervisor Vito Chiesa. “We’ve got to do this sooner rather than later.”

A decision is expected to be made at the supervisors’ next meeting on Feb. 25.