Mirgon to leave county service on Monday

Douglas County's beleaguered 911/Technology Services Director Richard Mirgon will no longer work for the county on Monday, it was announced Thursday.

Mirgon, who'd worked for the county for more than 17 years, is scheduled to return from a conference of the Association of Public-safety Communications Officials where he's first vice president, on Monday.

In a prepared release, Interim County Manager T. Michael Brown, said only that Mirgon will leave county employment.

Brown said the plan is to reorganize Mirgon's department.

"Recommendations for reorganization will be developed by working closely with the talented staff of the 911/Technology Services Department and various departments and agencies that receive services from the department, including the Douglas County Sheriff's Office, the East Fork Fire & Paramedic Districts, The Tahoe-Douglas Fire Department and the Alpine County Sheriff's Department."

Brown said those recommendations will be brought to commissioners in the near future for consideration.

The Douglas County Sheriff's Protective Association called last week for Mirgon's removal from his director's position after a critical grand jury report the week before.

"It has been clearly demonstrated that Director Mirgon has no motivation to correct the shortcomings of the system," the letter said. "His actions not only endanger our membership, he exposes the county to tremendous financial liability should a first responder's injury or death be linked to the inability to communicate. Director Mirgon has squandered precious county resources to attend lavish training conferences with no documented benefit to the county. His long-term arrogance and derision towards our personnel is completely unacceptable."

In a grand jury complaint filed last September, the association's board of directors cited several instances when deputies' communication equipment failed to perform in the field.

The complaint also criticized former Douglas County Manager Dan Holler for failing to resolve "supervisory shortcomings" addressed in the 2000-2001 grand jury findings.

Holler resigned in March to become city administrator in Grass Valley, Calif.

"The principal complaint is the failure of the (911/Emergency Management/Technology Services) division to address the gross inadequacy of the radio communications equipment used for transmissions of law enforcement, principally the Douglas County Sheriff's Office. The system failures also effect the operations of (Washoe) Tribal police officers, Animal Control officers, after-hours Alpine County Sheriff's Office, and periodic use by the Nevada Highway Patrol. The failures of the radio system promote an environment of extreme officer-safety perils in an era of limited personnel and increasingly violent criminal activities. The statistical probability of an officer injury or death increases daily. The county faces a tremendous liability in the event of an officer injury or death, contributed by the failure of communications equipment," the complaint said.