I think we all have our share of these types of Elected Officials. They have no clue as to what we do or how our system works. I dare any Elected Official to come to our Comm center and sit for even a few hours on a busy afternoon shift and then have them re-think their childish attitude! Too many of these people just sit in their office and make judgements on what we should have or how something should be run, when they have no idea what we even do!!!
To make this point I give you an example of what one of our County Commissioners did not too long ago: Our center was busy on afternoon shift one day and all of the dispatchers were on either 911 calls, or other non-emergency phone calls. If everybody is on the phone, the phone system sends the caller to the voice mail system and it gives you a choice to leave a message that we can return, or stay on hold and we will get to you when we are off of the other calls. When given this option, our Commissioner hung up and called 911 instead! (The voice mail system tells the caller that if they have an emergency to hang up and call 911...key phrase being "if you have an emergency")
Oh, yeah...the call with the Commissioner? He wanted to talk to our MSAG technician about an addressing problem!!!!!!!! He was asked politely to hang up and call on an non-emergency line. That is one thing I really love about this job, it is always different every day!
Tom
Mr. Rousso,
Your behavior and treatment of the 9-1-1 dispatchers on election eve is deplorable. You fabricated a call, trying to make it sound like a serious matter, in an attempt to get a quicker response from law enforcement.
Callers trying to make their call sound more serious is one of the most significant problems with 9-1-1 today. This ABUSE of the system prevents telecommunicators from doing their job properly. These calls will keep officers busy handling routine calls instead of true emergency calls. If citizens (and yes, you are a citizen) would just tell the truth when calling 9-1-1, the system would be allowed to work properly. This would reduce the response time to true emergencies. And I know if this incident had happened in Kansas, you would have been charged with making a false call. You as a council person should be setting an example of what to do, not a prime example of what not to do.
Mr. Rousso, in the text I read of your call (and listening to the tape), you state "I've got nothing about complaints on 911 since I've been on City Council. Nothing but complaints. And now I see why." I can understand why you receive the complaints too. It is because of inconsiderate people like you that lie about a call. You may have prevented an officer from responding to a true emergency. After listening to the calls and reading the transcript of the calls, the 9-1-1 dispatchers you spoke with did nothing wrong. They conducted themselves in a professional manner, even when being verbally abused by you. At least the parking garage attendant was polite and truthful in reporting the nature of the call.
I agree with council member Lynn Wheeler. 9-1-1 does not show preference to any public official. They are treated given the same service as the next citizen.
I have been a 9-1-1 telecommunicator for 14 years. I have been yelled and cursed at, but never to the point that you did. You scream several times, "Gimme a police car right now!" I can only speak for me, in Kansas. We do not have the Star Trek capabilities. We cannot beam a car to a location immediately. The officer has to drive the vehicle. Driving through traffic takes time, even if the response is red light and siren.
Mr. Rousso, I can tell you, many telecommunicators around the country are not happy with your behavior. You will likely hear from many more of us.
