New data from the Oakland Police Department shows significant improvements in 911 call answering times.
The improvements come after the NBC Bay Area Investigative Unit’s extensive reporting that showed the department at times has had the worst response times in the state.
“We want the community to know we are here for them,” OPD Bureau of Services Deputy Director Kiona Suttle said of the progress in response times. “We have prioritized dispatcher hiring so that every time someone calls 911 they have a competent and passionate professional on the other end.”
New numbers show from January to June, OPD is averaging answering around 70% of their calls within 15 seconds — a dramatic change from 2023 when dispatchers took an average of 55 seconds to answer all calls.
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Suttle acknowledges more still needs to be done to get to the state standard of answering 90% of all calls within 15 seconds.
“Although we are not where we want to be, we continue to make steady progress in meeting the state mandated answering speed and we have prioritized dispatcher hiring,” Suttle said.
Police said streamlined hiring to fill open dispatcher positions, updated 911 technology and implementing an automated system for non-emergency calls has helped reduce answering times significantly.
But continued attrition, a lengthy training process and competing with other agencies for qualified workers are presenting challenges to hire 13 more people by the end of the year.
“We are losing some of our employees to other agencies in the area,” Police Communications Manager Gina Cheng said. “Whether it is because of proximity to their home, or a better pay, or just workload and call volume; because Oakland does have one of the largest call volumes in the Bay Area.”
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With three new candidates set to start next month, OPD is now looking to have its 911 center fully staffed by sometime next year.
“Personal is definitely our biggest asset because no computer software can answer 911 calls and triage them like a human being,” Cheng said.
https://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/oakland-911-answer-times-improves/3922136/
