A recently approved state grant will bring an enhanced 911 emergency system to Stark County, the last remaining county in Illinois without one.
The $2.4 million award will cover the costs of implementing the system and constructing an Emergency Communications Center at the Stark County Sheriff’s Office in Toulon.
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This week I am going to highlight the important work done by ECOM, a department within the county that most of you would think I would never spotlight.
First and foremost, I have nothing but respect for anyone who accepts a job in an emergency communication center. The hours are long, the pay is horrible, and criticism from users and media are sometimes never ending.
POCATELLO — Even after more than two decades on the job, Pocatello Police Department dispatcher Brian Smith is still experiencing situations for the first time.
Though he’s helped parents who call 911 remain calm while in labor en route to the hospital, he recently coached a couple through his first actual delivery. Just 30 minutes later, Smith provided lifesaving instructions to a moth er with an unconscious infant unable to breathe. With Smith’s help via phone, the mother revived her child.
The Kingman 911 Communications Center has announced the addition of the Fire Priority Dispatch System to their ongoing use of the Medical Priority Dispatch System.
Together, these protocols enable public safety telecommunicators to provide essential safety instructions to callers and bystanders, and relay vital on-scene information to responders in Kingman and surrounding Mohave County communities, according to a City of Kingman news release.
The 911 emergency response system in the U.S. has been in use since 1968.
A University of Chicago initiative aims to modernize and strengthen the system – and they’ve just published a blueprint for how to do it.
The Aurora City Council will consider about a $1.34 million project to upgrade the facility where emergency calls are answered and dispatched in the city.
The city’s public safety answering point, and backup communications center, has not been updated since it was opened in January 2010, city officials said.
