N.Y. County Law § 300: Legislative findings and declaration of intent

§ 300. Legislative findings and declaration of intent. The legislature

recognizes the paramount importance of the health, safety and welfare of

the citizens of the state and further recognizes that when the lives or

property of its citizens are in imminent danger that timely and

appropriate assistance must be rendered.

The legislature recognizes further that such assistance is almost

always summoned by telephone and that a multiplicity of emergency

telephone numbers exist within any one county and that unintentional,

though avoidable, delays in reaching appropriate emergency aid can and

do occur to the detriment and jeopardy of life and property.

The legislature acknowledges that the three digit number, 911, is a

nationally recognized and applied telephone number which may be used to

summon emergency aid and to eliminate delays caused by lack of

familiarity with emergency numbers and by understandable confusion in

circumstances of crisis.

The legislature finds that the enhanced emergency telephone service

known as E911 provides substantial benefits beyond basic 911 systems

through the provision of selective routing and automatic number and

location identification and that these enhancements not only

significantly reduce the response time of emergency services but also

represent the state of the art in fail-safe emergency telephone system

technology.

The legislature further finds that a major obstacle to the

establishment of an E911 system in the various counties within the state

is the cost of the telecommunication equipment and services which are

necessary to provide such system.

The legislature further finds and declares that, by the enactment of

the provisions of this article, it is the intent of the legislature to

fulfill its obligation to provide for the health, safety and welfare of

the people of this state by providing counties with a funding mechanism

to assist in the payment of the costs associated with establishing and

maintaining an E911 system and thereby considerably increase the

potential for providing all citizens of this state with the valuable

services inherent in an E911 system.