TRAVERSE CITY — Grand Traverse County commissioners on Wednesday unanimously approved a $359,457 contract to replace the county’s 911 call-handling phone system, which officials say has become so unreliable that it sometimes reboots itself mid-call while dispatchers are answering emergencies.
Central Dispatch Director Corey LeCureux told commissioners during their regular meeting that the current system — an “Intrado Multi-node Viper Version 7” installed in 2021 — was expected to last a decade but has deteriorated to the point of crisis.
“One of my people will go to answer a 911 call, and the system just decides to reboot itself,” LeCureux said. “The current system is so fraught with technological problems, and it’s getting worse and worse, and it’s to the point where it is affecting our operations from time to time.”
In a memo to commissioners, LeCureux wrote that the current system “is a shared hosted solution that has created a myriad of malfunctions” and that a more modern system “is required to meet the challenges presented by call volume and changing technological standards.”
The county shares the Intrado system with nearly every 911 center from Traverse City to Mackinaw City under an intergovernmental agreement LeCureux brought before commissioners last June for cancellation. He said most of those partner centers are also abandoning the platform, and the current vendor — based in Colorado — has no service personnel in the state.
“The current vendor is unwilling to do what it takes to repair it unless we give them a dollar amount similar to what’s being proposed here in the RFP,” LeCureux said. “So at this point, I’m ready to get rid of it and move on, as are the other centers that are in our partnership.”
Central Dispatch issued a request for proposals in December 2025 and received four responses.
Ryzyliant led in technical compliance and tied with Vesta for the top score in system architecture and vendor qualifications. In his memo, LeCureux wrote that Ryzyliant “offered stronger redundancy, independent operation capabilities, and comprehensive cybersecurity measures.”
The system will be provided through Indiana-based INdigital Technologies, a company Central Dispatch already works with on Next Generation 911 core services. Jeff Hoffman, a sales engineer with INdigital who has more than 25 years of telecommunications experience, attended the meeting to answer technical questions.
A central requirement in the RFP was that the new system operate as a hybrid — running on both a local server and in the cloud — so 911 service would remain functional even if one component failed. According to the RFP, the system must also support voice, text, video and other multimedia, comply with NENA i3 and NG-SEC cybersecurity standards, and enable remote and mobile call-taking.
“If something catastrophic were to happen here — God knows what that would be, I don’t want any of it — but if it did happen, we could still be up and running because we’re backed up in the cloud, or vice versa,” LeCureux said.
He told commissioners the new system also offers mobile capabilities the current platform lacks, allowing dispatchers to run 911 operations from a laptop if they had to evacuate the building. The hardware footprint is dramatically smaller, taking up roughly 13 inches of rack space compared to what he described as a “monstrosity” currently housed upstairs.
“Our 911 heroes upstairs, they’re juggling 14 different software programs at once,” LeCureux said. “If we could condense that, that’s going to make it a whole lot easier on them.”
While Ryzyliant’s $359,457 implementation cost was higher than some competitors, its annual support cost of $72,222 gave it a significant long-term advantage. A five-year cost analysis presented to commissioners showed Ryzyliant’s total cost at $648,346, compared to $974,708 for Vesta and $1,748,515 for Carbyne. ModuComm was lowest at $339,469 but scored poorly on technical compliance.
LeCureux said he had originally planned to bundle the phone system into Project Alpha, the county’s planned $27 million expansion of its LaFranier Road campus that will include a new combined emergency operations and 911 dispatch center. But the accelerating failures forced his hand.
“I was hoping to build this out as we were building the new center, and our current system is getting so bad that this is becoming a crisis situation that we have to step up the timeline,” LeCureux said.
Implementation is expected to take approximately six months. If the contract begins in March, the system should be operational by late summer.
LeCureux said the system’s portability will allow a seamless transition to the new building. Because the software runs in the cloud, dispatchers can switch to cloud-based operations while the hardware is physically moved, maintaining 911 service throughout.
“We can put it on a laptop or we can put it on one of our stations,” he said. “It is a much smaller footprint, hardware wise. We could literally pick it up by ourselves and take it over to the new center and be pretty seamlessly up and running over there.”
Asked about the system’s expected lifespan, LeCureux said hardware would likely need replacement after about five years, with the software potentially lasting a decade — though he cautioned that rapid changes in telecommunications technology could alter that timeline.
“Think about Wi-Fi calling, for instance. It drives us crazy,” he said. “We’re built on a system that is meant to function on landline phones in your residence. And now, you know, my kids — they don’t know how to do anything on their phones without Wi-Fi.”
Commissioners approved the contract on a roll call vote with all members voting in favor.
A five-year contract for annual costs is anticipated to come back before the board for approval.