The San Diego Union-Tribune
SAN DIEGO — San Diegans should be heartbroken and outraged at the revelation that the parents of a newborn mortally bitten by the family dog a week ago drove their 3-day-old baby to the hospital themselves after two 911 calls went unanswered, the first lasting 28 seconds, the second lasting an interminable 34. That’s triple the standard, suggested by the National Emergency Number Association, of answering calls within 10 seconds 90 percent of the time.
The tragedy has cast a harsh light on a horrible fact: San Diego’s 911 dispatch center is woefully understaffed. Despite recent efforts by San Diego Mayor Kevin Faulconer to improve pay and staffing levels, the problem is taking too long to solve.
Put simply: We shouldn’t have to wait.
San Diego has 19 vacancies among 131 budgeted positions, a mayoral aide said Wednesday. That’s more dispatching vacancies than the city has had in any year since 2011 and triple the number of vacancies it had two years ago. The staffing shortage is clear, and to the mayor’s credit, beginning to be addressed. A month ago, dispatchers got a one-time $1,000 of merit pay. Two weeks ago, the Civil Service Commission approved, at the mayor’s request, starting dispatchers at about 10 percent higher hourly salaries than they’d been receiving. The hourly pay range now is $18.02 to $26.22.
In another change, the city is now recruiting year-round for dispatchers and expediting the hiring process. But because of the vacancies, the city is paying overtime when necessary to staff the call center. And that’s where the stresses in the system start to show. Dispatchers who are handling more calls than ever — some of them accidental or unjustified — are looking at longer wait times in a call center that pays its employees generally less than many comparable cities and requires they work extra shifts, further lowering morale.
That’s a recipe for disaster.
Michael Zucchet, the general manager for the city’s largest union, the Municipal Employees Association, which counts dispatchers as members, says the mayor has done more in months than his predecessors did in years to improve morale, starting with a new four-year contract in December, a visit to the call center in February and salary bumps more recently. But he asks, “Can they keep up with people leaving?” If not, this goes from crisis to worse.
Can San Diego promote the jobs better? Hire faster? Rely less on mandatory overtime designed to address emergencies and not force dispatchers to work longer just to meet staffing levels? Certainly.
Why wait for vacancies to train people? Larry Stirling, a former San Diego city councilman who was instrumental in establishing the San Diego area’s 911 system decades ago, has an idea: open-enrollment courses, perhaps at a local community college, for dispatchers who could be trained before they are needed, who could intern with actual dispatchers or answer non-emergency calls for experience and serve immediately when vacancies open.
It’s a stressful job, no doubt. The workload is relentless. But it can pay — both a salary and the reward of knowing you answered someone in need.
Staffing is an emergency. Let’s answer the call.
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