By By JOHN EBY / Dowagiac Daily News
CASSOPOLIS – No one wants to imagine loved ones with Alzheimer's disease, autism or Down's Syndrome wandering away and becoming lost, but Project Lifesaver tugs at the purse strings as well as the heart strings.
According to national averages, it costs $1,500 per hour to hunt for missing persons.
Cass County Sheriff Joe Underwood didn't ask the Board of Commissioners to appropriate the $7,680 Project Lifesaver start-up cost, which was raised privately last October with a sold-out fundraiser at the Council on Aging. Put in perspective, Project Lifesaver cost about as much as a five-hour search.
Charlie Wehner, a Saginaw County deputy sheriff, was at the E-911 dispatch center by the 1899 courthouse Wednesday to train five people in the operation of the chirping Project Lifesaver device, which resembles a television antenna.
"These will be the instructors who will instruct all our deputies," said Capt. Lyndon Parrish.
"We've had the program for four years in Saginaw," Wehner said. "We were the first to have it in Michigan.
"It's a two-day training. (Wednesday morning) we did book work and a PowerPoint presentation on the history of Project Lifesaver and the characteristics of Alzheimer's and dementia patients and autistic kids because that's who we deal with most of this time.
"This afternoon we're going to go out and show them how to use the device. (Today), we'll do a little bit of review, then the whole practical test. They have to find three transmitters in 15 minutes. If they can do that, they'll pass the test and get their certification."
"The purpose of Project Lifesaver is to bring family members home alive and well," Wehner said. "Once we hook them up, if they do wander, we can come with our device. They'll have a transmitter on their wrist the size of a watch. We can come with our receiver, get the signal and figure out where they're at. National average, less than 30 minutes. We've had four searches in Saginaw County. All of them lasted under 10 minutes with one officer – as opposed to nine hours with 20 officers. A lot of it depends on callers. The sooner they call us, we can get there right away and get the signal right away to find them sooner."
"We won't be searching," COA Executive Director Bob Cochrane said. "We're handling the financial side and the registration. There will be some ongoing fundraising to help fund the annual cost."
It costs $8.75 a month to maintain the program.
That charge per bracelet covers the cost of bands and replacement batteries.
On May 19, 2006, the Cass County Sheriff's Office received information about a missing 6-year-old child suffering from severe mental disabilities and a tendency to wander.
The call came into dispatch at 9:11 p.m.
The child was not located until 12:50 a.m.
It took an extensive amount of manpower to locate the child and almost four hours from the time the call came in, even though he was eventually found in a barn on a neighbor's property close to home.
The barn had been checked once, so the child was presumed to be moving and could have been located more rapidly wearing a Project Lifesaver bracelet.
Accounting for patrol units, supervisors, special units, from tracking dogs to helicopters, emergency responders such as EMS and fire departments and volunteers, the search on May 19, 2006, cost almost $6,000. If you're 80 years old, have Alzheimer's and wander at night when the temperatures dropping, time is of the essence in searching.