CASSOPOLIS — Thursday morning, a Cass County 911 dispatcher sits with laser focus at his desk, looking at several different screens when a red light lights up over his head alerting him to his next call.

“Cass County Dispatch,” he answers, preparing to send help to the caller.

While this is a normal day in the dispatcher’s day to day life, it will take a tax renewal for him to continue to perform his job effectively, according to the Cass County Sheriff’s Office.

The Cass County Sheriff’s Office is seeking a tax millage renewal for its 911 call center in order to fund operating costs. The millage renewal will be on the ballot for the upcoming Michigan primary elections on Aug. 7. It is for two-tenths of a mill, which comes out to $20 in winter property taxes for a home with $100,000 of taxable value. The millage will fund the center with about $480,000 per year of its overall $980,000 budget.

“This is very routine,” said Cass County Sheriff Richard Behnke. “This is just for our operating budget.”

“[The millage] is a small price to pay for emergency services,” added Dispatch Coordinator Jennifer Robinson. “In some ways, we are the backbone of the county. Calls for services come here whether it is an emergency or non-emergency.”

Currently, there are always two dispatchers at the call center, with a third during high volume times and dispatchers do more than just answer 911 calls. The center has a feature now where not only can people text 911, but 911 can text back in the event of a caller hang up. The center also added a program called SMART911. This service allows people to log onto SMART911.com, create an account and upload information about themselves or their home to their phone number for dispatchers to see. The center also has made upgrades in the last five years that have improved radio and location services.

Part of the importance of the millage renewal is that it will allow the 911 center to continue to make necessary upgrades like these as needed, Behnke said, though he added that the Sheriff’s Office is judicious with its funding.

More than just serving as 911, both Behnke and Robinson said the 911 dispatch center aids county residents in ways that people may not normally think about. For example, the dispatch center handles calls for the road commission.

“The road commission doesn’t have 24-hour dispatch, so after hours, calls come here and we send people to deal with things like trees in the road and things like that,” Behnke said. “Everyone thinks of police, fire and ambulance, but we deal with a lot of other services, as well.”

Without the millage, Behnke said the Cass County Sheriff’s Office would have to look at alternative funding for the center, as the millage makes up such a large percentage of the 911 center’s operating budget.

“We hope you will come out and support this,” Behnke said. “Every time this has come up for a vote it has been widely supported. We hope that continues.”