WEARE TWP. — A trial period of how medical responses are dispatched came to a close after a vote was taken during a regular meeting Wednesday morning of the Mason-Oceana 911 Board at the dispatch center.
The 90-day trial period involved having medical calls into Mason-Oceana 911 conferenced into Life EMS’s dispatch center in Grand Rapids. Life EMS dispatchers would set the call’s priority — from one to three, with one being the most severe.
Previously, Mason-Oceana 911 would set the priority…
PORTLAND, Ore. — Portland’s Community Safety Director said city leaders have failed to manage a series of public safety crises and said the mismanagement has led the city to where it is on a range of problems like police call volume, gun violence, and 911 wait times.
The comment came up in a meeting Thursday that was mostly focused on the dire situation inside Portland’s dispatch center, where wait times are as long as four or five minutes for people calling 911 in Multnomah County…
MONTPELIER — The Department of Public Safety has pulled the plug — at least temporarily — on a new computer assisted dispatch and records system for Vermont State Police and many local and county police agencies across the state.
The move came after department Commissioner Michael Schirling struggled Tuesday afternoon to explain the apparent meltdown that the system, known as Valcour, had earlier this week when it was rolled out to about two-dozen law enforcement agencies.
The rollout group included the 10 state police field offices, Department of Public Safety headquarters, and the entire Vermont Fish and Wildlife Department. The affected municipal agencies were spread throughout Vermont and ranged from the 17-member Williston Police down to the part-time police departments in Canaan and Brighton. Also affected were some active sheriff’s departments, including in Grand Isle and Essex counties…
Health One, a Seattle Fire Department program that responds to low-acuity crisis calls, is a relatively new alternative for 911 dispatchers.
By Paul Kiefer
The last time Seattle launched a new department—Seattle Information Technology, which brought IT staff from across the city under one roof—the consolidation took years. “In contrast, we had about eight months,” said Chris Lombard, who leads the city’s newest department: the Community Safety and Communications Center (CSCC), which began work at the beginning of June.
In some ways, creating the CSCC involved fewer moving parts than the infamously messy set-up of the massive citywide IT department. When plans to move the parking enforcement unit to the CSCC fell through this spring, Lombard was left overseeing a single, crucial, service: Seattle’s 911 call center. The center, historically a civilian unit inside the Seattle Police Department, will play a key role in the city’s efforts to shift away from a police-centric approach to public safety, and the city’s decision to house the 911 call center in the department was one of the first concrete steps in that effort…
The province is looking to enhance its ambulance service, with a focus on rural and remote locations.
In October, 24 ambulance stations will be converted from on-call paramedic staffing to 24/7 stations with eight full-time paramedics. Vancouver Island communities benefiting include Lake Cowichan, Port McNeill, Tofino, Cumberland, and Bowser.
As well, 26 smaller stations moving to a scheduled on-call staffing model are getting more permanent, regular paramedic jobs, starting on Nov. 1st. Island communities seeing this enhanced service include Alert Bay, Cortes Island, Port Alice, Port Clements, Sayward, Sointula, Tahsis, Texada Island, Wells and Zeballos.
“When we call 911 for help, British Columbians need to feel confident that help is on the way and that it will arrive quickly,” said B.C. health minister Adrian Dix…
Alexandria, Va. – The Association of Public-Safety Communications Officials (APCO) International has recently launched an update to the APCO Communications Training Officer (CTO) course. This course provides comprehensive training to experienced telecommunicators on the roles and responsibilities of CTOs in running an agency’s one-on-one training program. Previous editions of the CTO program have been implemented in hundreds of agencies nationwide. Two versions of the updated course are available: CTO 6th Edition and CTO 6th Edition Instructor. Delivery begins in January 2022, and both are now open for registration…
Learn about current efforts to continue to protect the 4.9 GHz Band for public safety as well as recent filings, key decisions impacting these efforts, and how you can support PSSA’s initiative to protect the 4.9 GHz band for public safety.
