by Linda Olmstead
We're now well into the first quarter of 2000. I've written about that "immediacy" syndrome affecting most all of us in this career field, so it shouldn't surprise anyone to hear that nothing changes as fast as any of us want things to change. (Okay, so there ARE a few anti-progress people working in some Comm Centers, somewhere; we could probably turn and point right to those of them working alongside us.)
On the other hand, there have always been significant planned changes looming perennially over some horizon in just about any public safety (and government) agency.
For example, we've been hearing about "a new facility" since the mid-80s, at last, best, collective recall. In 1994, we nearly experienced actual ground-breaking-just before the environmental testing of the lot came up ugly. That delay made it supremely easy to have the plans snipped neatly out of the budget.
Then the funds got re-directed elsewhere in the state. We're back at the "found a site to buy that meets our needs" status and some of us are trying not to get too excited. (One prospective site was within walking distance of my home and a few miles from those of our lieutenants, but there was this unfortunate set of railroad tracks running alongside the parcel. Dang. Guess the sound of trains blasting their horns near the crossing could cause some audio interference for us inside the Comm Center; we'd be the only ones there when the middle-of-the-night freight runs clattered past. I may have a personal fondness for trains passing in the night, but I don't have critical radio traffic to handle from my desk here at home.)
Anyway, we're still at least a couple years away from a new facility even if everything goes well and nothing derails the current plans. [sigh] But, looking back, we have had our CAD system for almost two years now, we finally have the piece of equipment allowing us to use our headsets for the telephone and radio at the same time, we've got ergonomic console furniture, we're getting new chairs within a month or two (they're purchased, just waiting to be built to specifications and delivered to each of our Comm Centers), we had our staffing allotment increased-now we just have to get up to staffing and that's one of those perennial problems!-and if I don't end this sentence pretty soon I'll be out of breath.
River Flooded
That's kinda how it is, isn't it? Don't hold your breath waiting for changes.And don't waste it complaining about the lack of progress in our agencies.
We're picking up another service with which to talk on the radio, getting more phone lines dedicated for a slew of additional call-boxes, and the next advertisement I see for cheap cellular phones so everybody in your freakin' family can have one, I'm afraid I just might "go postal." (No disrespect intended for those stable employees of the USPS, but y'all know what I mean, right?)
The weather here has finally turned the corner and the rainy season's started. A river crossing near the Comm Center was just closed due to flooding-about three months later than is usual. Now's the "fun" time of explaining to callers why they can't go where they want to go via the way they are used to going.
Mud-slides, trees down, roadways undercut and a couple of short-term voluntary evacuations. Officers get all decked out in their highly-visible banana-suits with reflective stripes and agency initials. Real fashion statements, and oh-so-comfortable, too. NOT!
Local law enforcement agencies are changing their vehicle colors to black and white. Hey, that's not fair! No, really; it's not because we "own" the colors or anything proprietary like that, but now a collective group of dispatchers from several agencies can get worried and stay anxious until the report of "some cop car" is positively identified as belonging to a specific agency.
Whether that's for a citizen's complaint or report of an officer-involved accident, or simply, "one of your cops is alongside me right now" sorts of in-progress, "rolling" events, it's another ambiguity impacting dispatchers who need to determine the appropriate notification processes.
We already suffer the brunt of "you guys" blanket accusations. Look, we didn't disconnect our headset cords and go out there and leave the ticket on your car parked in the same spot for two weeks, mister. We didn't arrest your sibling, spouse, neighbor or football star for anything; our partners in the field with the guns and badges did that! Nor were we able to magically produce a unit and drop it out of the sky right into the exact spot you thought one should have been. wait, I guess that is our fault, isn't it? Sometimes I get confused as to what "we" do and don't do. [suppressed snicker]
Loose Rocks
Like the other day when a concerned caller reported cows running along the top of their pasture and knocking rocks loose to roll down the hill and maybe even into the roadway. Oh, now that's something we can fix. She said it was a hazard, though!. Uh huh; cows in their pastures, knocking rocks loose. Somebody needs to go slow those cows down; they shouldn't run like that. Or maybe we need to de-stone the pastures? Just what the heck did she think we could do about that?
Luckily the dispatcher who took the call was working the radio at the time, or she'd probably have been dumbfounded by it when she read the details in the queue of incidents pending dispatch. Luck also had it that the appropriate beat unit happened to be tied up at the office on reports; she saved the tale for the moment he wandered in to ask what she had for him. I got to see that relay of information first hand. [grin]
We don't make these calls up, you know!
I love spoonerisms. Nothing like mangling a phrase over the air. One of my dispatchers told a unit about some "hales of bay" in the roadway. She turned in her chair to look towards my office window and caught me smiling. (It's not easy to sneak stuff like that past me-we Comm Sups generally monitor the radios while we complete our staff work.)
I "collect" amusing snippets of conversations on the phone while copying tapes for court, too. Another of my dispatchers requested a flatbed tow for a vehicle "in the cockroach position" at an accident scene. The gal at the tow company didn't need clarification; I guess that's a pretty evocative description of an upside-down car with wheels in the air.
Years ago, I once told a deputy to stand by with his transmission because I "was on Fire"-meaning I was busy on the fire channel. When I told him to go ahead, he first inquired as to my status, which confused me, because I hadn't realized I'd said anything the least bit odd. The dispatchers around me, however, were suffused with laughter.
Glowing Ball
Just a few weeks ago, a caller excitedly responded to my "9-1-1 Emergency, what are you reporting?" with this question: "Did anybody else see that thing in the sky??!?" Well, it was still daylight, so I gathered it wasn't the moon that prompted her inquiry, but I was a little afraid of what she might be trying to report. Yup, she saw something spectacularly scary, all right. It seems a brightly glowing thing, with red sparks spurting off in several directions, had crossed the highway in the sky ahead of her. Up real high or right across the roadway? Up high! The whole western sky was all bright gold and yellow now!
Neither one of us said the letters: UFO. Great, I thought, closing my eyes while I tried to pose subsequent questions in such a manner as to defuse that possibility. After determining her location (in her car, traveling down the highway in a rural area), I put her on transfer/hold to conference in the local PSAP that should probably handle such things. (Well, come on: if it wasn't actually landing on US 101, it's not something our road-dogs would handle, right?)
Noop, no UFO reports, and we agreed it must have been a missile launch from Vandenburg AFB. They're visible from this area on a fairly regular basis. We hadn't gotten any official word of any launches, but we are the last ones anybody tells about these things.
However, when I attempted to reassure my caller with the theory that seemed so reasonable to me and Fire Services dispatcher, she became a tad bit agitated. Why would "they" be launching missiles? (Uhhh.. because that's what they do at Vandenburg Air Force Base?)
I suddenly realized this woman had made an unfortunate mental connection between the word "missile" and the concept of War. That scares me, too, more than the idea that a UFO might have buzzed us, so I used the word "rocket" next. Rocket sounds more scientific, I guess. [shrugging helplessly] At least it did to her. Relieved, she ended her call to 9-1-1 and put away her cell phone to continue her travels with both hands on the steering wheel.
Alien Crash
I called back that allied agency dispatcher so we could snicker about our UFO report. He posed a well-considered concept: "Doesn't anybody ever think how unlikely it would be for a so-called highly advanced, technologically superior bunch of beings to travel hundreds and thousands of miles across space in an alien spacecraft, only to crash here?" I suppose that could be a little bit like having the alternator go out on your Mercedes Benz in the middle of the desert and not having your road-service membership card with you. Or a cell phone.
Television newscasts later that night confirmed our suspicions: Vandenburg AFB was indeed the source of the spectacular aerial display. I wondered if that caller felt good about her contact with 9-1-1, reassured by some official lady who'd told her that rockets were the same as missiles. My high school science teacher was probably still spinning in his grave.
Another routinely rueful situation: When someone tells a unit to "Stand by" only to have it barge ahead with a transmission, we all sigh and shrug our shoulders. Even if we'd mumbled, how do the two syllables of "stand by" get mistaken for the three syllables audible in "Go ahead?"
And what about those units who later whine that they told us their change in statusbut did they wait for the acknowledgment? NooooI've heard quite a few halves of conversations comprised of "Well, hell-OH! If I didn't acknowledge it, I didn't hear it!"
Here's one that frustrates us no end: misuse of "Rolling Wants"-when an officer wants to check for stolen status on a suspicious moving vehicle - but then asks for the registration expiration date. Okay, so do they want to know if it's a stolen car, or do they want to find out its registration fees have been paid?
We have a specific procedure-statewide-describing the high priority of a "rolling 29" and how it's to be processed. You see, no matter what is going on at that radio position, regardless of which requests may be pending, those go on hold until the "roller" request is handled and broadcast.
Yet certain officers will still ask for registration status. In the scheme of things, it's not such a big deal, but it makes us nuts. (And I know other officers are annoyed if they have to wait any longer than they think they should for their requests made on a routine basis.)
One night, a training officer and his rookie partner made several such inquiries. Each time, the dispatcher returned the prescribed information, minus the registration year. This annoyed the officer, naturally.
The fourth time he asked for it, she inquired-through gritted teeth-if they had "made a stop yet." His reply was, "Negative, not 'til we find out if it's expired or not." She'd dutifully run the plate despite her rising irritation, so she returned only the required information, adding, "When you make the stop I'll provide your expiration information."
I started dialing the number to the sergeant's office as soon as the anticipated snotty response issued from the speakers. Even with one ear covered by the telephone receiver, I could hear the dispatcher poll her partners in the room (off the air, thank god), "Why is he using a Rolling 29 to make reg checks, anyway? He doesn't want to stop a car unless it's an easy ticket, or what? Too much trouble to do real work? What would happen if I said, "Okay, this one's wanted, but it's got current registration; plan to stop it anyway?""
It was such a good argument I quoted it to the sergeant when he answered the phone. That training officer doesn't seem to run "rollers" very much any more-at least not for registration purposes. [dimpling]
Happy to be here, proud to serve.
Linda
March 2000
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