San Benito County supervisors received an update on the transition of 911 dispatch to Santa Cruz at a recent meeting, and some board members still had concern about coverage in rural pockets.
Scotty Douglas, the general manager of Santa Cruz Regional 9-1-1, presented to the board, discussing the positive outcomes as well as a few hiccups they have encountered with moving dispatch service from San Benito to Santa Cruz.
The Santa Cruz center took on the equivalent of seven full-time staff members from San Benito County and the original plans called for all the dispatchers to be moved into the Santa Cruz location by March 2012. Before the transition, San Benito County had the equivalent of 12 full-time staff members.
“We’ve been able to transfer services much sooner,” Douglas said. “Dispatch has been out of our building (in Santa Cruz) since Oct. 19.”
One of the biggest issues encountered during the transition was in San Juan Canyon, where 911 calls were accidentally routed to the San Benito dispatch center instead of the Santa Cruz center for a short period on one day. Douglas said that AT&T, which services the area, did not route the phone lines properly.
Over an eight-minute period, six calls went unanswered. The calls came in from the San Juan Canyon area about a fire that turned out to be a controlled burn in Monterey County. The dispatchers found that the callers who tried to get through on a landline got through on cell phones. AT&T was contacted and Douglas said the issue was resolved in 18 minutes. He stressed that the concerned residents got through by another means other than a landline.
But two supervisors remained concerned about rural parts of the county that rely heavily on landlines because cell service is spotty in some areas of the county.
“Can it happen again?” asked Anthony Botelho, a supervisor in the San Juan area. “There are pockets up there where you can’t get out with cell phone service.”
A representative from AT&T attended the meeting and answered a few basic questions, and offered to set up meetings between a more technical representative and residents if there was still concerns about routing.
“We worked closely to see what was missed and we quickly restored service with a temporary solution,” said Betty Saxton, an area manager for AT&T on the Central Coast, “and then a permanent solution within a day. We apologize and are glad that it truly wasn’t a major emergency.”
Jerry Muenzer, the supervisor for southern San Benito County, expressed concern over the routing of 911 calls through the Pinnacle Phone Company servicing that region.
“Those people do not have cell phones,” Muenzer said.
He asked if Douglas could coordinate with local law enforcement to have sheriff’s deputies go out to rural households, knock on the doors and ask them to try calling 911 to make sure the calls are properly routed.
“We did that and we have been doing that informally,” said Darren Thompson, the San Benito County sheriff. “We can do something to initiate contact and encourage residents to check their phones.”
“South County residents don’t have cell phones,” Muenzer said. “We need to make every effort that this it not going to happen.”
Muenzer also said that he had heard from some residents who said they had called 911 and have had dispatchers who were uncertain about locations.
“They say they don’t live over there (in San Benito,)” Muenzer said.
Douglas said he would talk to his staff about that and said he had been trying to stress that they are all one team now. He said he would work with his dispatchers to have them ask more clarifying questions to get the addresses.
Supervisor Robert Rivas said that he has talked to Hollister firefighters about the transition. He said while the firefighters said they haven’t had issues with the transition, they did say that they had not received any training.
“When it comes to public safety, there is a close relationship between the department and dispatch,” Rivas said. “Now that is non-existent. Have the sheriff deputies received any type of training? Small things are different.”
Douglas said he understood it might feel like there is a disconnect during the initial transition. He said when some of the San Benito dispatchers complete training and move over to answering calls, he would encourage some of the Santa Cruz dispatchers to meet with local public safety agencies for things such as “ride-alongs.”
“We anticipate really starting up in January,” Douglas said.
He also said a task team of managers, dispatchers and representatives from fire, ambulance and law enforcement agencies will be working together to look at policies to see if any changes need to be made.
