At this point, the new McFarland Police Department does not have anyone to dispatch for them. They don't have the money or time to set up a comm center. They wanted the Kern County Sheriff's Department to do it, but they said no thank you. They city of McFarland already owes the Sheriff's Department a couple of million and change for the police services we have been providing for the last 18 years. They then asked Delano Police Department to do it, but Delano turned them down (bad blood between the cities). They then went to Shafter Police Department, who was considering it, but had to back out due to technical reasons. (Shafter's radios don't work in McFarland). McFarland has gone back to Delano and asked again, and the last I heard, Delano PD was going to their city council next week to see if they would approve it.
As for coverage in the City of McFarland, We had a Sargent, 2 Senior deputies and I think 9 or 10 deputies assigned to the City. We also have other deputies that handle the county areas. The city units were rarely pulled from the city (it did happen occasionally), but by the same token, if the fur hit the fan in the city, the county units were all in the city helping. They actually got many more deputies than they were paying for. Not to mention the use of detectives, K-9 units, gang units, the helicopter and evidence technicians.
They city decided they could do it on their own with more people at a much cheaper cost. I don't see how, unless you pay your officers much less than everyone else in the area.
I don't know what will happen at this point, we are just waiting to see. I'm just glad I'm not involved in the whole mess.