Ulster County moves ahead with new operations center

Ulster County is moving ahead with plans to build a new government operations center in New Paltz. The County Legislature has approved spending $3 million to buy 57.3 acres of land on Paradies Lane in New Paltz, of which six acres will be used for the center.

The new center is planned to house the Ulster County Emergency Operations Center (EOC), Government Operations Center (GOC), all the divisions of the Ulster County Department of Emergency Services, and the County”™s Public Safety Answering Point (PSAP) 911 operations.

Everett Erichsen, the county”™s director of emergency services, said that they answer more than 130,000 emergency and non-emergency calls a year at their 911 call center.

“With the critical technology changes of Next Generation 911 right around the corner, making the necessary upgrades now to our County Public Safety Answering Point and bringing all the divisions within the Department of Emergency Services under one roof is essential to ensuring that we continue to provide the highest level of excellence in critical services to the residents and visitors of our county,” Erichsen said.

This year’s first phase of the project included site selection. Next year, the second phase is slated to include design of the building as well as the actual construction. The total cost of the project has yet to be finalized.

The project had been announced a year ago, in Nov. 2021, by then-County Executive Pat Ryan, who has since been elected to Congress.

Former Ulster County Executive Pat Ryan in Nov. 2021 announcing the plan for a new government operations center.

“I am very proud that we are finally investing to build a facility that respects the tremendous work that they do to serve the people of Ulster County,” Ryan said during a speech at the site of the current operations center on Golden Hill Drive in Kingston. “An expanded, state-of-the-art Emergency Management Center will help keep our community safe and ensure we deliver the best possible support to our residents at their moment of greatest need.”

The current Acting Ulster County Executive, Johanna Contreras, in discussing the County Legislature having approved funding to buy the land for the new center, said, “After extensive assessment and consideration of financial and environmental impacts, the legislature took a critical step forward by approving a site to house our proposed state-of-the-art Government Operations Center. This facility will enable our tireless first responders and emergency management team to provide high-quality emergency services to Ulster County residents at their moments of greatest need. It is centrally located within Ulster County and will allow us to better serve the Southern parts of our county.”

Abe Uchitelle of Kingston, the legislature’s deputy majority leader, said, “As recent ice storms and tornadoes have shown us, our climate is changing and our public safety infrastructure must evolve. I am excited for us to modernize and harden the infrastructure that keeps our community safe as our county responds to the new generation of life-threatening challenges that surely lie ahead.”