More than 70 people were in attendance at the Jan. 26 ground-breaking ceremony for the Williamson County Emergency Services Operations Center, which will be constructed behind the animal shelter on S.E. Inner Loop in Georgetown.

The new center is projected to be finished by next summer and includes 30,000 square feet of space for county departments, including 911 communications, Emergency Management and Hazardous Materials as well as some personnel from the Sheriff's Office and Williamson County & Cities Health District.

"It will do a great deal to bringing all the resources we have together," Sheriff James Wilson said.

Wilson said the new center, located at 2100 S.E. Inner Loop in Georgetown, will be important when the county deals with widespread emergencies such as fires or flooding.

"Those things are going to happen, and we've got to be able to deal with them," he said.

Precinct 2 Commissioner Cynthia Long thanked the members of the previous commissioners court, who had issued bonds for the project in 2006. The center is expected to cost $12 million, with an additional $6 million in electronic and computer-aided dispatch equipment.

"[The building] wouldn't have happened without some leadership from the previous court," she said.

Also at the ceremony, Senior Director of Emergency Services John Sneed announced that the road to be built next to the center will be named Tracy Chambers Lane. Chambers worked for Williamson County EMS for 20 years before moving to Alpine, where she died in 2010 in the line of duty, Sneed said.