Ridgefield police, fire to upgrade dispatch

Departments aim to reduce response times

RIDGEFIELD — The fire and police departments look to eliminate a brief delay in response times by consolidating and adding to their dispatch units.

The consolidation would require combining both departments’ dispatch efforts and hiring additional help at a cost of about $130,000, according to a budget proposal made to the Board of Selectman during a meeting Thursday night .

“We envision a central dispatch facility. Our plan is to put the fire dispatcher up in the police dispatch area alongside the police dispatcher and to cross-train each of them,” Fire Chief Jerry Myers said.

Emergency responses suffer small de

lays because the two dispatchers work in different sectors, often having to transfer calls to one another and repeat similar protocols.

When an emergency call is made, it goes through to the police dispatch center but does not appear in the fire department’s dispatch system. The dispatcher takes down basic information from the caller, in case the individual has to hang up or gets disconnected.

If the call is for fire or emergency medical services, the call then has to be transferred to the fire department.

From there, the fire dispatcher has to repeat a similar protocol to obtain basic information, spurring a redundancy and delay in response time.

If another call comes in, or a different emergency line rings from responding units requesting more information, the dispatcher isn’t able to pick it up without interrupting the current call or letting it ring until the phone line is cleared.

While the dispatchers are on a call, they aren’t able to answer other calls or alert responding units to the situation, Myers said.

“By cross-training both fire and police dispatch, having it be all civilian, you would eliminate that transfer, save time on response and save time due to the gathering of information,” Police Chief Jeff Kreitz said.

Moving both dispatchers into a central location and training them to understand both fire and police protocols allows them to help one another and “respond to other emergencies,” Myers said.

In addition to a central dispatch center, Kreitz and Myers noted the need for additional help in dispatcher roles.

“There is a need to add a couple of part-time positions, to fill potential holes in the schedule so we maintain the two dispatchers 24 hours a day, seven days a week,” Myers said.

Tacking on several more parttime dispatchers would permit the town to have dispatch services available around the clock. The cost to do this is “in the area of $130,000 a year” for the part-time employee salaries, according to Myers.

The Board of Selectman is reviewing the departments’ budget proposals. Kreitz said he is “hopeful” and “we’re always looking for ways to improve and be more efficient.”