Oakland Chief Gives Dispatchers More Authority

The new chief of the Oakland (Calif.) police department has taken six months to get a feel for the department, and is now moving forward with changes, including giving the comm center dispatchers more authority to determine incident priorities and deploy officers, and hiring vacant dispatcher positions. Chief Anthony Batts was sworn in last October to shake up the department, which works in one of the countries highest-crime cities. Now he’s revised the CAD priority assignments to include more types of Priority 1 incidents, and has authorized dispatchers to send officers Code 3 to those incidents. Batts says the previous response time to Priority 1 incidents was 15 minutes—in a city where you could traverse the high-crime district in less than 10 minutes driving 25 mph. Now, officers and dispatchers won’t have to wonder if Code 3 is appropriate. “It removes the gray area,” a lieutenant said. Batts also intends to fill 14 vacant positions despite a city hiring freeze. Read more about the changes and Batts’ firsts ride-along here.