NATCHEZ — The sirens that alert citizens to bad weather conditions aren’t working properly, Adams County Emergency Management Director Stan Owens said at Tuesday’s Board of Supervisors meeting.

“They’re at least 20 years old — probably older than that,” he said. “The radio is so old that it literally does not have a brand name stamped on it.”

Owens said he discovered that the sirens were malfunctioning when he performed silent tests two or three weeks ago.

“We didn’t physically test it over the past two months because of the flooding conditions — we didn’t want to instill any panic,” he said.

After the silent tests showed that there was a problem with the system, Owens said, he placed an order to replace the parts that aren’t working properly.

“It’s going to take about four weeks for them to come in,” he said. “It’s really specialized equipment that has to communicate with 11 different sirens and a dial-in modem so we can dial in and activate them.

“It’s hit or miss whether (the siren system) is going to work over the next few weeks.”

Hopefully, Owens said, the sirens will be back in working order by Aug. 1.

“It’s just really old equipment that finally decided to quit on us,” he said.

The parts needed to repair the system will cost approximately $7,700.

“The supervisors budget money every year to put up a new siren in the county,” Owens said. “I had a little money left over from that, so I was able to scrape enough together so I didn’t have to ask for an increased budget.”

In the meantime, citizens should rely on the Code Red system, he said.

The Code Red system calls households and businesses to alert them to the fact that bad weather is approaching.

Board President Darryl Grennell emphasized its importance.

“Things like this happen, but it’s important for citizens in Adams County to be signed up for Code Red,” he said of the sirens’ malfunction.

Nearly 6,000 phone numbers are already registered in the Code Red database.

“I’d like to see that doubled,” Owens said.

The system can make nearly 3,000 calls per minute, he added.

To register with the Code Red database, visit adamscountyms.gov or call 601-442-7021.

In other news:

4 The board voted to extend an invitation to legislative delegation members on the state level to discuss finances at its next meeting.

“You can lower (property) taxes for people on fixed income and over 85 years old,” said Grady Boykin, an Adams County resident of 51 years who attended the meeting. “I’m just concerned about fairness for people who live in Adams County.”

Supervisor Henry Watts said he recognizes problems with raised taxes.

“I’ve voted three times to lower property taxes since I’ve been on the board, and I won’t vote to raise them,” he said.

4 Supervisor Mike Lazarus said the county’s inmates are being “stretched as thin as they can be stretched” with work-release projects around town, and the board considered bringing in more inmates from the county.

“We’ve utilized state inmates, but we had to actually use them on state roads (alone),” Grennell said.

For example, he said, the state inmates took part in a clean-up program through Mississippi Department of Transportation.

“If we can find some more (inmates), that’s great,” Lazarus said. “But ours are busy. It seems like every problem there is someone says we have to use inmates.”