"We would have been in bad trouble," said Julie Righter, communications coordinator of the Lincoln Emergency Communications Center. "We would have been scrambling."
But when a water main broke in September 2005, the staff transitioned effortlessly -- no 911 calls went unanswered, and service was uninterrupted. For 12 weeks, the center's staff operated in the backup center -- thanks to prior emergency planning and preparation.
Preparedness is ideal, but plans aren't formulated unless someone has the foresight to build redundancy into the operation. But if every U.S. Public Safety Answering Point (PSAP) -- dispatch offices that receive 911 calls from the public -- was forced to evacuate, the results wouldn't always be so easy to accept.
"There are a lot of PSAPs across the United States that are prepared and have emergency plans that include backup PSAPs," said Terry Hall, communications manager for York County, Va., and former president of the Association of Public-Safety Communications Officials (APCO). "Do most in the nation have those plans?" he said. "The answer is no."
It's becoming more common for PSAPs to either create redundancy in the form of backup 911 centers or cultivate relationships with neighboring PSAPs to share resources should one PSAP become disabled.
Having a backup PSAP or a relationship with another PSAP where resources can be shared is critical, as is involving staff in contingency plans in case of an emergency -- one of the many lessons learned during Hurricane Katrina.
Coveting Staff
The idea, Righter said, is to have a level of redundancy that doesn't diminish your level of service and keeps your staff out of danger.
"We've got to cross-train people," Hall said. "We've got to have a backup and we've got to have good emergency plans for them so they can take care of their families." Cross-training involves training employees from one PSAP on how to work at another PSAP.
The backup PSAP was critical to Righter and her staff, but might not be necessary for every jurisdiction. "A smaller entity," she said, referring to a jurisdiction smaller than Lincoln's 250,000 population, "might not need what we have, but we've got to have it. If we were to send all of our phone calls to the county to the west of us, they would be crushed. They just can't handle 900 phone calls a day. They don't have the equipment or staff. There are areas across the country that may not need a backup center; they may have an agreement with the neighboring jurisdiction."
In the case of a pandemic, PSAPs would be in jeopardy if contingency plans aren't instituted to deal with the absenteeism, Hall said. "If predictions are right, 50 percent of your staff is going to be out," he said. "Most centers don't have extra people running around. In fact, most centers are understaffed."
During Hurricane Katrina, PSAPs had to deal with the problem of dwindling staffs. "When the hurricanes hit, already your 911 centers have sharply reduced staff," said Rick Jones, Operations Issues director for the National Emergency Number Association. "At the same time, the reduced staff in some of the hardest hit areas not only had to take up the slack, but had to deal with personal problems. They had houses that were damaged, family members who hadn't been found -- all these kinds of things. It was about day three or four when things really started to take a mental toll."
Hall said working with other PSAPs is necessary in case of the loss of staff during a crisis. York and James City counties, Va., are 45 miles apart, but have redundancy plans where each is the backup for the other should one go under. Since the centers nearly mirror each other technologically, staff at either center can substitute at both centers.
"The backup plans I'm referring to are redundant plans," Hall said. "Let's say we had the pandemic come in and 50 percent of our people are out. That means the community is going to be sick and our 911 call volume is going to be high. We can't take a 50 percent reduction, so you combine resources. That way you have one fully staffed center. You can get your well people in there and you have your redundancy there."
In the case of a pandemic or another disaster, dispatchers are commodities, and the competition sometimes gets in the way of cross-training. "The biggest issue we have with that as a nation is with 911 staffing shortages," Hall said. "We're scared to go out and cross-train people, and scared to go to other centers because we're hiring each other's people left and right."
Adrenaline Junkies
Most PSAPs recognize the value of the dispatcher and develop contingency plans that account for the dispatcher's life outside the 911 center. "To be quite honest with you," Hall said, "when you're here taking care of other people, you need to know that your own home is taken care of so they're not up here worrying about that."
Most PSAPs have plans and supplies in place to care for their personnel, recognizing that there may be times when dispatchers are on the job for extended periods, and family, transportation and food are issues.
"You hear stories about people staying at PSAPs, and management having to pry them off the consoles and make sure they get breaks," Hall said. "We need to make sure they get counseling, make sure they have the same things afforded to them as other public safety agencies do."
That was a message that came through loud and clear during Katrina. "If you listened to some of the lessons learned and what went on down there from the personnel point of view, dispatchers are adrenaline junkies," Hall said. "They do their best work when things are hot. Well, how long can you take things being hot? We're used to having a tornado, structure fire or another event, then the dispatcher goes off and smokes a cigarette, eats 40 pounds of chocolate and they sit back down behind the console and they've blown off the stress. Now do that for 24, 36, 48 hours, and then get to sleep only five hours and go do it again."
There were stories from Katrina of 911 dispatchers having to work days on end without breaks and supplies. "One of the things we learned is that we quickly run out of things we need," Hall said. "I've heard stories of some places that keep canned ravioli, and then once a year or twice a year they throw a hurricane party and eat everything they've got so it doesn't go bad. Some dispatch centers say you have to come to work prepared for 24 hours, and the ones with some training were saying three days; but now as an agency, we have to stock up and plan on them being there for seven to 10 days."
Many companies now supply meals ready to eat (MREs), and most PSAPs are stocking up on them. "I spent 28 days down South after the hurricanes and I can't begin to tell you how good an MRE tastes," Hall said. "If you don't believe it, don't eat anything for a day and see what it tastes like the next day."
Though a backup center isn't necessary everywhere, some form of redundancy and planning for having additional dispatchers on hand for an extended period is essential. Righter is glad she attended an APCO conference in 1999 that gave her the idea to propose construction of the backup center.
She's also glad for the 24-hour exercises the center executes three times a year to help make evacuations go smoothly. "Now," she said, "the drills will be a piece of cake."
