BANGOR – Wanted: Roommate to share heating, electricity, rent and other living expenses.

Facing an aging communications system and a tight budget, officials from the Maine Department of Public Safety met Tuesday in Penobscot County to discuss the possibility of sharing space in a joint communications facility at a site to be determined.

“I’m here to offer an open hand,” Public Safety Commissioner Michael Cantara told the Penobscot County commissioners during their regular meeting at the Penobscot County Courthouse. Also present were Bangor city officials.

The state wants to replace its public safety radio systems, a patchwork operation that Cantara described as decrepit. The department has been authorized to borrow up to $50 million to build a replacement system, he said.

Meanwhile, state officials are looking for places where savings can be made, including sharing a building for dispatching and possibly other operations in Penobscot County. The state police now share law enforcement coverage in the county with the Penobscot County Sheriff’s Department, so officials said it was natural to consider extending that cooperative effort.

The proposal would not merge the dispatching services, just house them in the same building where they would share costs of operating and maintaining the building.

Currently three dispatch centers are being operated within a 7-mile radius: the state police barracks in Orono; the Bangor Police Department; and the Penobscot Regional Communications Center, just down the street from the Bangor police station.

State officials said that not only might the state police dispatch center in Orono be moved but also the barracks itself.

“We have the flexibility to look elsewhere in the county area,” Lt. Donald Pomelow, interim director for the state’s communications bureau, said.

The proposal received a warm reception from the county commissioners who themselves are facing an aging radio system. A consultant last year recommended replacing the existing system with a microwave operation at a cost of about $29 million, a price tag the commissioners don’t like.

The commissioners liked the proposal since it could lead to taxpayer savings and also might result in further savings by sharing towers for radio communications.

“It’s a no-brainer as far as the county is concerned,” Commissioner Tom Davis said.

A committee will be established that will meet over the next few months and report back in early December to see whether a cooperative effort can move forward.

The timing was bad for Bangor, which is building a new police station on Main Street. The new facility doesn’t have room for more than one dispatch center, Bangor Police Chief Don Winslow told the board. Had such discussions been held 21/2 years ago, such an arrangement would be a welcome possibility, he said.

Although discussions have just begun, the county may have a potential site already. The Maine District Court on Hammond Street will be moving to a new facility in the next three to five years and the county intends to move its regional dispatch center – now in the court’s basement – into the space being vacated.

One potential wrinkle is that the county may be moving quicker than the state. Although no timetable has been set, “it’s certainly much sooner than the three-to five-year time frame,” Penobscot County Administrator Bill Collins said at the meeting.

Time is also pressing for spending $360,000 in federal Homeland Security funds that the county has set aside for communications but which must be spent by Nov. 30 or it reverts to the state funding pool.

Throw into the mix plans by the state to relocate the Maine Department of Transportation operations on Hogan Road – thereby creating another possible site – and there is more uncertainty.

“It’s kind of a soup here and I’m not sure where it’s being stirred at the moment,” Collins said.