BY JEFF CHUDZINSKINorth Country This Week

CANTON -- St. Lawrence County legislators have agreed to a one-year contract with Blue Wing Services Inc. to utilize vacant tower space to generate revenue for the county.

County Attorney Steve Button spoke on the matter during the June 24 finance committee meeting, saying the lease agreement is allowed under federal regulations.

"As I think everyone here is aware, our towers have the capacity under their Federal Communications Commission licenses to be able to collocate with potential commercial carriers," he said.

Button said with those regulations in place, the county can lease the tower space to carriers to generate revenue in the ballpark of $100,000 to $150,000 over a five-year period.

Since 2014, Blue Wing has assisted the county with planning, implementation and design of the St. Lawrence County Emergency Services Interoperability Telecommunications Tower Project, a partnership that has seen multiple public safety radio towers go up over the last decade.

Towers have been installed in Colton, Gouverneur, Hammond, Massena, Ogdensburg, Russell and Waddington, officials said.

County officials say during the implementation phase of the tower projects it was determined that collocations of user groups, like private carriers, could increase the likelihood of project approvals from various state and federal agencies as well.

As part of the agreement Blue Wing will retain 20% of all revenue for managing, collecting fees, maintaining and leasing the tower space, county officials say.

No additional fees can be charged and no additional payments for service will be issued for Blue Wing under the agreement.

In order for an entity to lease space county legislators will have to sign off on each individual agreement with a resolution, Button said.

Just when this will happen is still up in the air, Button said.

Button said the agreement has been drafted with general language but is not set in stone.

"We have prepared a contract, a proposed contract, associated with this leasing arrangement. Most of my contracts are drafted with general language that indicates the effective date commences upon final execution by the county," he said.

Button noted that a handful of tower projects are still in the works, with towers and repeaters in the southern portion of the county not yet online.

"We may have circumstances that preclude us from commencing on a specific date," he said.

In order to get the deal started, Button said they may have to "massage the effective date."

Button said the pre-existing relationship with Blue Wing and his review of the arrangements between Blue Wing and the county made it apparent that they were out of contract in regard to the development of towers.

The selection process to enter into the initial contract with Blue Wing was like many with the county, with a Request for Proposal (RFP) process used.

The competitive process allows many companies to submit a proposal to the county for consideration.

Before moving forward with the new agreement with Blue Wing, Button said he went through an evaluation process that included reviewing two other entities. After that time, he said it was apparent that Blue Wing was the best option.

"Generally speaking, the other entities were almost double the retained revenue compared to Blue Wing," he said.

The other two entities said they would retain 40-60% of the total revenue generated, while Blue Wing will only retain 20%.

Button said Blue Wing also has the pedigree with respect to the development of the towers themselves, something that will help as more towers are put up around the county.

But Legislator Larry Denesha said he would not support the measure, saying their service has been "less than stellar."

"For a myriad of reasons I cannot support this resolution," he said.

Button said he was aware of the concerns and took them into consideration, which is why the contract will be a one-year test run to see how well the process works with Blue Wing.

Legislators will now move to finalize the contract at the full board meeting, scheduled for July 1.