By PETER MATHEWS
Lexington Herald Leader (Kentucky)
Ann Johnson thought big when she became Montgomery County’s 911 director last year.
She wanted a state-of-the-art $1.7 million dispatching system that would streamline the process and provide police officers, firefighters and EMTs with much more information than they used to get.
She’s well on her way.
In August the county and city of Mount Sterling received a $500,000 Homeland Security grant for a computer-aided dispatch, or CAD, system.
Local officials are getting an additional $200,000 in federal money to buy computers.
The center, formerly housed in the Mount Sterling police station, is now operated from a renovated former fire station in an industrial park.
The center is funded by county residents who pay a $1.95 surcharge each month on their phone bills. The county and Mount Sterling contribute about $150,000 a year as well.
With the old system, if someone had a medical emergency, the call was transferred from the police department to the fire department, then to EMS.
Besides the extra layer of communication, the systems weren’t interoperable. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security is encouraging communities to obtain interoperable systems, meaning that if a Mount Sterling police officer is sent to, say, New Orleans, the communication codes and equipment would be the same as they are in Kentucky.
Last month, Montgomery officials contracted with a company in Skokie, Ill., for the CAD system.
When it’s up and running, the system will take information from a call and “shove it into an officer’s case report,” Johnson said. It will map the call and identify the cell tower from which a wireless call originates.
Police and rescue workers will be able to get information quickly about previous incidents at the location. They’ll see floor plans of factories or hidden corridors of schools, as well as mug shots, fingerprints and tattoos of suspects.
The system will also compile crime statistics and eliminate much of their paperwork.
Johnson hopes to begin training on the new system in February or March.
“It’ll make our lives a lot easier,” Johnson said, “which might make somebody’s life a lot longer.”