Carbon County stands to lose approximately $1.5 million if a 911 fee bill is allowed to expire in 2024.

Commissioners’ Chairman Wayne Nothstein said that the bill, Act 12 of 2015, sunsets on Jan. 31, 2024. The act provides funding through 911 surcharges on traditional wireline, wireless and voice-over-IP telephone lines. These surcharges are collected by your service provider and appear as a fee on your billing statement.

The money is then used to help upgrade, maintain and improve the 911 communications system.

Nothstein said that changing technology is hard to keep up with, such as text messaging and video messaging.

“Technology is extremely difficult to keep up with and expensive to keep up,” he said.

Carbon County receives 80 percent of the fees collected, while the remaining 20 percent is portioned off to the interconnectivity funds, which provide funding for collaborative 911 upgrades; and the Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency, which operates the program.

“It’s extremely important that we start educating our legislative people,” he said. “If it doesn’t get passed, it all comes back to the commissioners and having to raise taxes.”