Two Sheriff’s Department vehicles totaled in storms

tahoe — The Tahoe driven by Erath County Sheriff's Department Chief Deputy Jason Upshaw was a total loss according to the county's insurance adjuster. However, the insurance will only cover $15,000 of the estimated $35,000 it will take to replace the unit. || JESSIE HORTON photos

By JESSIE HORTON

TheFlashToday.com NEWS & SPORTS – FREE & LOCAL

ERATH COUNTY (May 11, 2015) — Have you met with the insurance adjuster yet? If he’s already been by, some residents will be calling him back after a second round of storms hit the area over the weekend.

Erath County Commissioners spent a good portion of their meeting discussing the recent storms. More importantly, how to replace two Tahoes in use at the Erath County Sheriff’s Office. According to Chief Deputy Jason Upshaw, the Tahoes (one was driven by Upshaw, the other by Investigator Bobby Mendez) were both in use during the first round of storms that hit Dublin. They were both totaled by the insurance adjustor last week.

The problem is that even though the money for the vehicles from the insurance won’t be here right away and those vehicles are very much needed by the department Upshaw and county officials said. In order to get those vehicles replaced, and those replacements in use, as quick as possible, the commissioners voted unanimously to grant the sheriff’s department an estimated $70,000 to replace those vehicles.

According to Erath County Treasurer Donna Kelly told commissioners the insurance totaled the vehicles, but would not be giving the county nearly what it costs to replace them due to the age of the two vehicles in question.

“The estimated total we’ll receive for those two units is $20,000,” she said Monday. “$15,000 for one and $5,000 for the older vehicle. The 2014 Tahoes the sheriff’s department has found through Defender (a company the county has worked with previously) will cost more than that and we need to cover the cost until the insurance comes in, then the difference.”

Kelly and Upshaw told the commissioners the $50,000 would come from a combination of budgets, including moving funds from the renovation of the old Long Hotel as well as the Sheriff’s Department budget. The cost of the vehicles is an estimated $29,000 each, and then the cost of outfitting the units would be another $6,000 each.

In other business, the commissioners approved a new agreement with TAC (who does payroll taxes and other IRS work for the county) and the purchasing of a new truck for the maintenance barn with funds already in the budget.