ORANGE BEACH, Ala. — In their continued effort to hold down city expenses, Orange Beach is considering terminating their mosquito contract with Vector Disease Control, Inc. and administering a program in house.

Currently, Orange Beach is the only city in the county that provides its citizens this service from a third party, but Tim Tucker, director of Public Works for the city, believes that with assistance from the county, Orange Beach can provide the same disease control that Vector is providing.

Vector is a nationwide mosquito control service provider, with mosquito surveillance and control operations in 14 states. Their contracts offer a comprehensive and complete program for the control of mosquitoes and other arthropods of public health importance.

“If we can do everything that they are doing and do it right, I don’t have a problem with it,” said Councilwoman Joni Blalock at a recent council meeting.

Vector’s program includes surveillance, source reduction, public education, habitat manipulation, larviciding and adulticiding to reduce the abundance of mosquitoes and mosquito-borne diseases in the area. They have been working in accordance with a three-year contract that is completed in December.

If the contract is not renewed and the city takes over the process, it could save Orange Beach $90,000 per year.

“This is no reflection on Vector or the job that they have done,” said Mayor Tony Kennon. “This is simply a cost saving measure on our part. We can always go back to them if we can’t accomplish the task.”

City Administrator Ken Grimes said the city will still make every effort to make sure all prevention methods that are possible will still be used.

“We hope that we can even do more specialized prevention because we will have the funds available to do that. Also, we have talked to Gulf Shores and this is one area where we can do some joint services with them,” Grimes said.

Grimes said the city will work closely with Baldwin County in tracking and monitoring the mosquito population.

Orange Beach will likely continue to contract with Vector for aerial spraying, but Grimes said the problem with that is if the Gulf State Park or surrounding cities are not also being sprayed, it is of limited value to the city.

“Like the mayor said, the cancellation of this contract is in no way a reflection of anything provided by or the work done by Vector,” Grimes said. “They have done a great job. This is purely a budgetary cutting measure.  We firmly believe that we can provide, as a city, what is currently been provided, but we will likely have to contract out the aerial service.”

The city will likely ask for a professional services contract quote on an as-needed basis so that they can stay current on prices and rates established should the city need to enter another agreement in the future