Bryant can continue using a mass notification system after the city paid a delinquent bill for the service Tuesday, Mayor Jill Dabbs said.

The city signed up with Emergency Communications Network's notification system, known as CodeRed, in 2008. The system allows the city to send out telephone calls, text messages and emails to the more than 6,000 phone numbers registered for the service for alerts, including street closures and boil orders.

But when the city issued a precautionary boil order May 30, residents never received notifications through CodeRed. Dabbs has said the City Council passed a bare-bones budget in 2014, cutting appropriations, including those for the notification system.

But council members say they never took the service out of the budget, nor did they discuss getting rid of the service during the city's weeklong budget workshops.

The service initially cost the city $15,000. In 2012, the money came from the city's Information Technology Department, according to city records.

The next year, the service cost fell to $10,000 because Saline County took over weather alerts. That same year, the Bryant Police Department paid for the notification system, city records show.

On Monday, council members voted to again fund the system, splitting the bill evenly among five municipal departments. The fire, police, street, water and wastewater departments will pay $2,000 a piece, according to the resolution appropriating funds for the service.

Monday's special meeting left some council members with lingering questions, as Dabbs, City Attorney Chris Madison and Finance Director Ken Rhone were not present.

Alderman Brenda Miller said city officials received a bill for the services in early January -- before the council approved a budget.

"The budget was not passed until Jan. 31," Miller said. "If [CodeRed] needed to be in the budget, or if it was left out of the budget, there were 25 days to get it in the budget. That is where the buck stops."

Bryant Fire Chief J.P. Jordan got an invoice to extend CodeRed for this year on Dec. 18, according to an email he sent Dabbs that day.

"I gave it to the Finance Director last year and that is the last I knew of it," he wrote in the email. "I gave it to Dana [Poindexter] to forward to you to see if you wanted to continue it next year with the budgetary issues currently."

Dabbs responded minutes later, saying she would call the company and negotiate based on the city's usage in 2013.

Jordan sent another email to the mayor on Feb. 13, saying Emergency Communications Network left a message "regarding the city's code red service." In a responding email, Dabbs said, "I'm taking care of this."

On April 23, the company contacted the city via email, attaching an overdue invoice.

By the time the city paid the bill Tuesday, it was more than 160 days overdue, emails between the company's sales representative and Alderman Randy Cox show.

"Your CodeRED service period is 1/1/2014 -- 12/31/2014 -- and, as we are already well into this service period it is critical that this balance be paid," Emergency Communications Network accountant Kelly Saxer wrote to Cox on Monday. "My manager is very much wanting me to establish some communication with you and get a clear timeline for payment of this current invoice."

The city didn't have to pay late fees, Cox said.

The service contract automatically renews each year, unless one of the parties gives a 30-day notice of termination.

Bryant is allowed some 30,000 messages for the $10,000, according to the contract with Emergency Communications Network. Any emergency messages, or those "delivered for instances that are an immediate danger to life and/or property," are not deducted from the original amount, the contract says.

The city used 3,611 messages in 2013, records show.

Dabbs said the precautionary boil order in May was the first time the city needed to use the service all year. The boil order followed a water-main break that caused a reduction in water pressure for more than 1,000 businesses and residents, said Cox, who originally backed CodeRed as the city's fire chief in 2008.

"We lost city revenue through that," he said, adding that even a precautionary boil order is an emergency because of health regulations.

Residents were still notified through "all the normal ways that most cities alert their citizens for a precautionary boil order" -- social media and news releases, Dabbs said. At the time, the city asked county officials to send out a notification via CodeRed, Dabbs said, but the county didn't have that service available.

"[The city] was still in good standing" with Emergency Communications Network at the time, Dabbs said. "I didn't know that. I just didn't use it because we hadn't paid for it."

She said CodeRed was "a very easy issue for Randy Cox to politicize as he is running for mayor." Cox has said public safety has always been a priority for him.

"Coming from emergency services, I know how important this is and how many people really rely on it," Cox said. "We got to fix it."

The system, Dabbs said, was "kind of out of sight, out of mind and on the back-burner."

"We're six months into the year, and it's the first time we've needed to use it," she said. Like other budget items that have changed and been put up for council approval, "it's when things come up."

Metro on 06/18/2014