Public Input Session For Dispatch Study

Speakers are labeled SPEAKER_N. This transcript is machine-generated.

Recording

Just
Okay, I'd like to start the
public input session
for the uh dispatch study. Um first I'd
like to introduce everyone to Sher Bush
from ADCOM. She is uh the individual
that was assigned to this project from
ADCOM. Um we are happy to have her here.
Um so this is an opportunity for
residents. it is on. Um this is an
opportunity for residents to come up and
share with her any information,
feedback, but it is specific to the
dispatching department. U and so we want
to keep that focus. This isn't about New
London police. This isn't about New
London fire. This isn't about the
ambulance. This is truly about the
dispatching function within the town.
Um, and so she is here to take notes.
She is here to intake feedback
information that folks have. Um, and
then she will take that back as part of
all the information gathering that she
is doing while she's here over the next
few days um, to help her pull together
recommendations.
So, I've got this list here of folks who
have signed in. BB and Janet, I know
that you had a chance individually to be
interviewed earlier today by Sher.
anything that you wanted to sh any
additional thoughts? Great. Colin
Beasley,
if you do do you have anything that you
wanted to share, questions, comments?
Um, and just ask that when you come up
to the mic, turn it on and then just
announce your name, please.
>> Colonel Beasley, I'm a resident. Sherry,
thanks for joining us. Uh, I have
questions actually more than comments.
Uh, and I have something I want to hand
over to you at the end of my my
discussion.
uh and I don't know whether you can
answer the question so I guess you can
get back to us if you can't. uh what for
number one what are the operations and
cost data you're looking at in your
analysis
and I'm specifically thinking through on
KPIs standards
or reports are being generated
uh things of that
>> I didn't catch all that you said KPIs
and wells did you say
>> standards for dispatching function
uh what is the R the second question is
what is the RFI referenced in your
response to the town's RFP. That's been
a question we've been asking on various
meetings. Do you have an answer to that?
What is the RFI?
>> What is in it? What ask for?
>> So, in your response to the town's RFP.
Uh you mentioned that you were going to
conduct an RFI.
>> What are you going to do? What is the
RFI going to be seeking? Uh well, I
think in general, at least what it
sounds like, what you're saying is that
that process of discovery. Um the RFI is
but one document of that and it's just a
list of documents that if they have
them, we would appreciate them sharing
so that we can review them, past
reports, budgetary information, things
of that nature. Um we also provided to
them a survey that collects
demographics, statistics, technology
inventory, things of that nature. Um
those are things that internally we've
talked about it that there are certain
parts of those that could be made
public. Um obviously some redaction for
security purposes like their technology
and things like that. Um but those are
two different
>> instruments tools that we've provided
that we've asked for response from.
>> Um they just received those within the
past two weeks. Um the survey I believe
has been completed. Um I am here for the
first time today
>> and have some conducted some interviews
and we'll conduct some more tomorrow.
That part of it is listening sessions
which this is one of them.
>> Um where just uh sit down with specific
stakeholders um the chief the select men
sat in the dispatch center for a few
hours today. U went over to Sunipe make
sure I say it right um and spoke with
the police chief and the fire chief over
there. um tomorrow will be more of the
same of engaging stakeholders and
listening to what their thoughts are
about the options that are in front of
New London. So the RFI as the way if I
understood you correctly you're
describing it is the process and and we
stakeholder engagement discovery. Okay.
Data collection. Okay.
>> So we're in the midst of that now. Um
and it will all be used to create the
analysis.
>> Okay.
>> Okay. So I'm that's fine. I I I
appreciate the context now. I was
misunderstanding when you had referenced
the RFI that I had the impression you
you were going to issue a request for
information to some party or parties.
Um,
>> no, it's to the town of New London.
>> Okay.
>> Yes.
>> Um,
what what alternative dispatch centers
are you going to be looking at in your
four scenario analysis?
>> Um, and I'll depend on you to correct me
if I get this wrong. Um, we're looking
specifically at whether there should be
a change, whether that is New London
becomes its own independent without
serving any towns dispatch center. Uh,
what if New London and the towns went to
another dispatch center? And that could
be a split. It doesn't have to be
everybody packs up and goes to one town.
Excuse me. And also if everything
remains the same. So for the scenario
where New London would go somewhere
else, what are you looking at the
alternative dispatch centers in New in
New Hampshire that we could go to and
getting specific data on them?
>> Uh no, that's not the step that you're
at right now. It's what would it take
for you to move? What would be the
impact on the town of New London if you
were to move? And as we've discovered
here today and and certainly knew ahead
of time, it's more than just the town.
It's the other towns that are served.
the impact, what would have to happen in
order for those changes to be made in
order for you to go anywhere, what would
have to happen both operationally,
technologically, the infrastructure, and
the people.
>> So, I I I I might be I might be um
misunderstanding the intention here. So
I I I was understanding that the study
was going to offer up to the town
um
the impact associated with the
financials and the operations
performance on those four alternatives.
So it's not about what is the impact of
what is it going to take to move but
what are those options and what are the
alternative cost and operations
parameters for those options. So if we
were going to move to handover, what
does handover cost per month or per year
versus what we charge ourselves per
year? How does handover operate from a
performance point of view annually on
their KPIs versus our KPIs?
It is with that information the town can
decide whether it makes any sense to
move. Are we going to get that kind of
information from you? At a high level,
the comparables, yes, but not a deep
dive because that's a a whole other
effort and it's pretty large effort.
Normally, you want to study internally
what needs to change here or what should
change or what should not change. What
are the investments that have been made
here before you start looking elsewhere?
And I understand that your alternatives
could be vast. You could split every
town to a different 911 center in
different parts of the state if you
wanted to. Technically, you could. The
biggest hurdle that you guys have to get
past would be how to connect back to
this area. And I don't think it's
speaking out of school to talk about
your radio system. Um, so that's
something we have to look at. What would
that take? Because that is tied to the
earth. It's tied to here. and the only
way someone else could have access to it
is to connect to it to then speak to
your response agencies. So those are the
types of things and costs that we're
looking at right now. So if you were to
make a change, what would that look
like? What would that impact be no
matter what the change is?
>> I don't know how the town is going to
understand implication if we don't get
data on the other centers. So when you
say you're going to come come at it from
a higher level, what does that mean?
Are you going to look at handover?
>> You use the example of handover. We're
not able to go to handover and sit down
with those people, examine their
operations, examine their budgetary and
all of that. We can make a phone call
and talk to them and say, "So, what is
the process? If you were to take on
another PAP, what would that fee
structure potentially look like?" We can
do that, but we need to have exactly
where you want to look. And the problem
that you have is you could look in 10 15
other directions.
>> So I Okay, I I I
don't think this is going to get what we
want. As an FYI, my own personal
opinion. Um
and we could talk forever and I I'll
leave it to other people to come up and
maybe we can talk afterwards. I I think
that um trying to understand what the
annual charge would be for the scenarios
that we outlined in the RFP and and one
of those scenarios might be our going to
an alternative center. The other one was
to split and I believe there is one
location that offers fire department
only. I don't recall the name of it. I'm
sure that somebody here does. Um so that
information could be made available from
that organization as to what they would
charge us and how they would perform
their function. So we can compare that
charge with a handover or another
alternative. And I would frankly
leverage when you take a look at uh I
would leverage the
uh New Hampshire North count north
country interoperability uh uh
consortium. No
>> consortium.
>> Consortium. Thank you. um
>> you're already part of that right now,
>> right? So there's multitude of of uh
dispatch centers that are part of that
consortium. So uh looking at those
locations would minimize the sort of
cost we need to incur because we're
using the same technology base and using
that same platform should allow for a
transition to be much more easy. So I
would hope that we'd get out of this
analysis some assessment of what centers
have that platform. What are the costs
that those centers would charge us if we
were to go to those centers? How do
those centers behave on an operations
performance point of view versus our
center? And with that information, we
can then have the conversation about do
the alternatives come across at a less
at at a equal or or or less cost at a
equal or better performance. That's what
I would hope come out of the study. Do
you think that's a possibility that will
come out of this?
>> At this first stage, I don't think to
the depth that you're hoping that it
would. The first stage really needs to
consider the things that aren't on your
list and that is internal to New London
and the towns that it serves. So that's
the first phase is what is the what
would have to happen internally to the
relationships, the technology, the
infrastructure and the operations in
order to make any change. What would
that look like? How would that go down?
What might that cost? The next phase is
if you decide, well, I think we should
look outside of this even after we've
studied this part of it and then say,
"Okay, specifically we want to go to
Hanover. Who wants to go to Hanover?
Okay, we've got three towns including
New London that wants to go there." And
then you go to Hanover and you say,
"This is the situation we have. We have
this body of work. We have this
technology limitations. The CAD part is
actually and frankly going to be one of
your easiest parts because there is this
consortium.
>> Correct.
>> But there's other technologies that bear
the only way that the police department
knows where to go
>> is getting on a radio system and talking
to them.
>> Right.
>> Correct. So that part right there is a
huge cost if you were to change anything
to do with your radio system, letting
someone else have connectivity to it,
letting someone else use it. All of
those require reprogramming, possibly
different sites, different equipment.
So, those are things that we lay out as
here's your cost considerations and what
they might cost you no matter what your
change is.
>> So, uh will your cost when you lay out
the cost um are you going to be talking
about a range of cost or are you going
to have definitive cost because you know
it might cost us something. It might not
cost us anything. So you can lay out
>> it's going to cost you something whether
it's dollars or something else. You
could have operational disruption.
>> Yeah. Well,
>> you could have loss of situational
awareness. You have loss of coordinated
resources. So any change is going to
cost you something. And the idea is do
you balance that with what you think
you're going to gain? What is it you're
trying to fix? What is it that you're
trying to gain out of this?
>> But if you haven't got the analysis done
as to what your alternatives are, you
don't know how to balance that against
the gain. Candidly, I think that we
should be doing the reverse of what
you're suggesting. We should be
understanding what would be the cost and
operations advantage or disadvantage
associated with moving to another site.
The only way to figure that out is by
understanding what those other sites
offer for cost. And if it if it proves
at a financial level, high level, that
it makes sense either performance-wise
or financially to move dispatch
somewhere else. Then you go down the
deeper level and say what would it take
to move?
>> Well, you're talking about two different
sets of costs here. Yeah. There is the
cost of providing a service. Yeah. Which
is what you're talking about. Hey, uh,
dispatch centers A, B, and C. What do
you charge correct to provide the
service? Correct. But then there has to
be prep done on your
>> No, I understand that. Right. That's the
transition technology, right? Exactly.
There's capital costs involved. There's
transition costs involved. There's
operational considerations for staff. um
and the service levels can be impacted.
So that part of it, if you're not 100%
on what that is and what that would take
and what the impact of a change would be
on those things, then knowing that you
could go somewhere else for some other
cost, that's not the full cost.
>> No, I appreciate that. I alls I'm saying
is I believe
I we're it's fine. I mean, it is what it
is. It's going to be the result of what
you do. I believe understanding the cost
of the alternatives provides you with a
framework. I'll give you an example.
>> Sorry, we have only 45 more minutes and
a number of folks. So, I want to make
sure
>> ask other questions then and then if
other if there's more time then I'll be
happy to get up and talk about it again.
Um, who are you interviewing for your
interviews that you're here for? Who?
And later on, I guess you're going to do
interviews on the phone.
>> Exactly. Who you interviewing? uh
executive leadership so of the agencies
and of the towns. Um we've spent time in
and I will tomorrow again in the actual
dispatch center. Um not only observing
and talking to them because they're the
most impacted group of stakeholders here
as a staff inside the center but seeing
how they operate, what their workflows
are, uh where their sticking points are,
their pain points are and learning about
how they use the tools which is the
technology.
and then also observing firsthand what
that service is.
>> Are you interviewing anybody down below
in the organizations?
>> Are you gonna interview?
>> We have a focus group scheduled for
tomorrow for any dispatch staff that
we've missed.
>> Um we have the this public meeting. We
have another meeting tomorrow evening. I
probably should let Ashley speak.
>> Yeah. No, no, you're right. We do have
the um uh meeting tomorrow with the
current dispatch staff. We have two uh
staff from other towns coming tomorrow
night to be interviewed by Sherry. She
will conduct the remainder of the
interviews via phone with those other
entities that weren't able to be here in
person.
>> Are we interviewing anyone in the
Northern Fire Department or the Fire
Ward?
>> Sorry.
>> Are we interviewing anybody on the New
London Fire Department or Fire Awards?
>> Yes. Tomorrow night.
>> Tomorrow night.
>> Yep.
>> Okay.
Um,
will we will we be having additional
feedback sessions on the study? This is
it.
>> This is it.
>> Okay. Okay. Uh, I'll leave the mic to
someone else and if there's time
afterwards, I'll continue my
conversation if that's okay. And, uh,
Sher, I'd like to leave you with a
presentation. Uh, I crafted this
presentation. It's probably two years
ago now.
uh it provides with a high level
assessment of the financials and
operations data and I would appreciate
you taking a look at this putting into
your record and reflecting on it and
perhaps responding to it in your respon
in your report. Okay.
>> Name, number, email address are all
there. Feel free. Okay. Thank you so
much.
Lou Bodha.
>> Good afternoon. Um I'm Lubon. I'm your
emergency management director and um I'm
here
to bring some um you know some items
that impact
the presence of dispatch in the town of
New London. And I will only do it I I
will limit myself to the effect that it
has on emergency management.
First, the purpose of emergency
management in a town is to coordinate
activities with all stakeholders in the
town with issues of public safety, visav
disasters and emergencies.
We have an e a local emergency
operations plan that details in order of
priority the threats that a town uh may
or may not face. In this town, there's
one event and I will speak to that that
may bring the town to its knees and it's
already happened twice which is a severe
ice storm. A severe ice storm has twice
basically closed down the town. We came
fairly close uh this past winter
uh when an ice storm threatened to
basically disrupt all the town
activities.
A dispatch center, it is the key, it is
the core around which all those
activities revolve.
because of staffing. We are, as you may
know, we're in the transition in in a
transition from a fully volunteer to a
hybrid fire department. We just do not
have the the staffing for there to be uh
full-time firefighters in the emergency
operations center. Once we activate the
emergency operations center, pretty much
the only ones that you'll find in the
emergency operations center are going to
be the town administrator and myself.
Most other towns, most other places from
the size of New London on up will have
dedicated people inside of the emergency
uh the emergency center to coordinate
activities and to lies with the state
and federal government in matters
affecting that that particular event. We
do not have the staffing either in fire
or police or ambulance or mass scare uh
to in order to do that in an event such
as happened in 2008
would be of such magnitude that it would
create uh what we call emergency support
functions. The activations of these
emergency support functions almost
fully. Um and um the last time that we
the the the the one that we came close
and uh Ashley and I were in the fire
department,
uh the re the the requests for
assistance, the request for information,
the visav uh organization that we had to
that we had to generate immediately
was only possible due to the presence of
a coordinated wellestablished dispatch
center that may be a that could be the
communications between an emergency
operation center and the field. Not only
that, they would give us the essential
elements of information the to be able
for us to translate to requests to and
from the state. The state is hungry for
information because in in a case of the
activation of an emergency operation
center, they want to know what's going
on. The governor wants to know know
what's going on. The state police wants
to know what's going on and as a result
they're going to be calling us every
five minutes with updates with requests
from updates. They want to know what
streets are closed. They want to know uh
the the status of our powers uh of our
power system. We the emergency operation
center needs to coordinate quite closely
with Eversource.
There is a myriad of uh requests for
information in an event such as an ice
major ice storm that we have to suffice
with two people. It is absolutely
impossible. And I would be and I'm not
uh frugal when I tell you that the lack
of action that would be precipitated by
the absence of a wellestablished
dispatch center could result in damage
to property or perhaps even the loss of
life. when you need people, when you
need the the um the expertise of the
ambulance service, the hospital, the
police, fire, when you have multiple
trees down, when you have when you have
power disruption, you need a
well-coordinated service. So I would I
would be and and and I I have absolutely
no qualms telling you that um the
dispatch center it is an essential
element of the emergency management
process in this town. That is why it is
in the emergency operations center.
That's why I consider to be a lifesaver
and a need for this community.
Do you have any questions?
Thank you.
Tom Carly. Do you have
>> Tom Carly? I'm a resident in London. Um
I think the people that were involved in
giving input and drafting the RFP. Um
we're pretty adamant that there needed
to be robust financial analysis
including a comparison of New London's
dispatch cost to a peer group of towns.
How much could would would we save if we
went to Hanover or Marramac County or
whatever. And the the um the big bogey
which people don't want to talk about is
if we get a new police um station, we're
going to dump five to six million
dollars into the dispatch operation. Um
which seems to me
you put all the risk on the taxpayers in
New London. We operate under one-year
contracts. We should have a five or 10
year contracts. Um,
I just find it amazing that Handover has
risen to servicing 26 towns. We have
dropped from 11 to four. Handover is
obviously doing something right. They've
cut over 26 different towns. This is not
rocket scientist stuff. And they they
have to deal with that's all the issues
that that um were just brought up about
ice storms and all that. So, I just
think absent a robust financial
analysis, the select board will not be
in a position to make a decision on
anything. We'll have wasted $30,000. And
I think we're pretty adamant that we
needed to get this. And I mean, this is
my greatest nightmare confirmed. And,
you know, I just we're wasting 30 grand.
Thanks,
>> Bob Bowers. Did you have anything that
you wanted?
>> Bob, you dropped a paper. Did you need
that? Okay.
>> My name is Bob Bowers. I'm a resident of
New London. Um, I came tonight to try to
get more information and understanding
and thought I had somewhat of an
understanding and listening to some of
the questions going on. I'm not sure I
do. Um,
but I got the contract and read it and
the first paragraph talks about what
you're going to do. The rest is, pardon
me, boilerplate.
Um,
I had thought, and correct me that it
sounds like you're not doing this. I had
thought that the idea was to
look at what the current operation with
the towns we have currently costs.
What it might cost in future years
because of operational increases.
What it might cost because you had to
make new capital improvements
and you now got a piece of paper that
says this is what it costs.
Then you would compare that with if you
went to a regional center. And I
understand now a lot goes in that I
hadn't really thought about about
analyzing what that kind of move would
take. Um but as a broad statement I had
thought it was going to be what would it
cost for the town of New London and I
understand there's a relating issue with
the other four towns. What would it cost
the town of New London to go to a
regional system? In other words, what
would they charge us the way we charge
Wilmet?
You would then have a cost basis for
regional, cost basis for current
operational. You would probably have to
add in the cost of how do you make that
work? And you've now got to cross
comparisons.
You would then say, "All right, what do
we have for the pros and cons of the
current system? What do you have for the
pros and cons of a regional system?" And
you make a little list, pros and cons.
And that can then be analyzed without
needing a recommendation, which I'm
you're probably going to do, but you
don't need to. The selectman and the
public can say, "Here's what it costs.
Here's what it costs. Here's the good
things about this. Good things about
this. Bad. bad. You now have a basis for
making a rational decision on what looks
like might work best.
Um, for various reasons when you came
and talked in the interview process,
um, a couple things stood out.
Three things stood out for me. One was
you don't make the decision based on
cost. And I interpreted that to mean
cost alone because cost will have a
impact for a tax raising entity on what
they do. That's why Wilmet doesn't have
their own dispatch system. They use us.
So cost has an effect, but it shouldn't
be the overriding concern.
You also mentioned at that point that a
regional system provided what it sounds
like Lou was talking about um a broader
background of people and numbers of
people so that with our dispatch in an
ice storm emergency you've got problems
with the number of people in a regional
if we're the only one being hit for
example instead of everybody you've got
more people that can step in and cover
all the calls that come in. As I
understand it, though I don't think you
mentioned this, you probably have better
trained people because you've got a
bigger purse to pay people to have
better training. You've got that kind of
thing so you can respond better. That's
a pro. Now, there's a lot of pros that
would be for this as well, but looking
at those things, um,
you're talking a lot about getting a lot
of the data for next steps,
but I'll I'll put it this way. I I send
out a newsletter to a number of people
every month and and I wanted to say what
we're going to do and I wanted to
understand it and that's what I thought
I was going to say but it sounds like
you're not going to do that. Is that
correct?
>> I think we're talking about a couple of
different things.
No, I understand. Yeah.
>> Yeah.
Okay.
>> Well, yeah. So,
>> are are you saying yes, I'm correct in
the analysis I laid out for you, or are
you saying I'm incorrect? Are you going
to do a this is how much it costs
currently and in the future? This is how
much it costs if you go to the regional
adding in the cost of the transfer over.
Are you going to have those two things?
>> Are you going to have a list of the good
points of a regional and the bad points
of a regional and the good points of
keeping it the way it is? And I
understand you could have New London
alone, but I got convinced that that
probably didn't make a lot of sense.
look at what we have and continue it or
regional. So you're going to do the pros
and cons, the costs of current
operations into the future, costs of
regional with added costs of connecting
and then pros and cons. You will be
doing that.
>> Okay? and and and I have trouble
understanding
language that shows up, but the scope of
work is that first paragraph that lists
a whole bunch of things that are being
done. One, two, and three will take
three to five months.
So that's your scope of work, that one
paragraph.
>> Yeah.
>> Yeah.
>> Okay.
>> Okay. And then one reason I'm confused
is that scope of work. Nowhere mentions
anywhere what I just described as cost,
cost, pros, cons. But that's what you'll
be doing.
We adapt our analysis and our
>> Oh, no. I I I I didn't mean to be
insulting or anything. I just the rest
of the language I could pretty much skim
and didn't tell me anything about what
you were doing in this contract. Yeah, I
know you're going to do a a deeper
analysis and lay it out on an individual
basis. I understand that. Yeah. Okay.
>> Okay.
>> Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah.
>> Okay.
>> Yeah.
>> Yeah.
>> Okay.
>> Yeah. Okay.
Okay.
>> Okay.
>> That that that's true. But the start
point is New London. I think
>> Yeah. Yeah.
That's the sort of thing I mean by pros
and cons. It's it's not but if if I
being a layman that can't understand
things sometimes the older I get the
less I can
>> will I
will I be able to read your report and
say ah I want to stay where we are
because of these things or
>> that's
what
>> okay
Okay.
>> Yeah.
>> Okay.
>> I'm not going to listen to your
recommendation.
>> Okay. So, as long as I understand that
goal, I guess that's what I'm going to
say in my newsletter that you're headed
toward what I think is the right goal.
Appreciate it. Thank you very much.
>> Ed Anderson.
>> Good evening.
Um, when I heard about this taking place
tonight, I thought it would be important
to come by and share something that not
a lot of people have, and that's the
amount of history that I have here with
the New London Dispatch. I originally
came to the town of New London back in
around 1993 where I joined the New
London Police Cadet program and then I
was immediately hired as a dispatcher.
So
I literally lived with dispatch when we
were in the basement below you through
growing from 1993 to 2001 to the
changeover where we came upstairs
um to when I retired back in 2000. I can
go on for hours of reasons to support um
keeping the dispatch center here.
There's not enough time to go over that.
But I thought it would be important to
bring up just some things that stood out
for me uh this evening. Uh one is I was
able and fortunate enough to live
through the 1998 and 2008 ice storms. So
I know what the importance was of having
a dispatch center here and how it the
amount of calls for service that came in
and the importance of having the
dispatch center manned. We I think we're
running two to three dispatchers around
the clock down here working shifts. Um
all the way up to the importance of the
shared communities that we have. The
town in New London is in the middle of
what I call the X. It's the X of nowhere
and the X of everything where from
Franklin to Claremont
um Burlington, Vermont to Methuan and
everything seems to end up in this
community.
So
in 2014, I went through a survey about
uh moving dispatch out. This is the
second time I guess that this is coming
forward. And just a couple things I'll
point out about that as I continue is we
had looked at handover as well as
Marramat County. Uh Marramat County
dispatch at that point if it was going
forward is one of the issues that seemed
to be the best uh for us. But something
And it's a small thing, but an important
thing that stood out to me was Marramac
County said, "When we take over your
dispatch center, we're taking over your
radio frequencies. You're not getting
them back, and we're taking over all
your equipment." The minute we take
that, we have a lot, hundreds and
hundreds of thousands of dollars worth
of equipment, radios, and towers. That
was a big fear to say, "What if this
doesn't work well a year from now? We've
lost our radio frequencies. they're not
giving them back because with narrow
banding, uh, frequencies were harder and
harder to get.
Uh, another thing that note that I
pointed out was if you move dispatch for
cost savings, I'm hoping what you look
into is what you're going to have to add
to the police department. The Atlanta
Police Department cannot run with an
empty seat in front of that window.
We're a 24-hour police department, seven
days a week with a full-time hospital
and a full-time college.
You're not going to be able to leave a
single officer out here on a midnight
shift. I was in a horrific fight at the
college. Um, a gentleman trying to
remove my firearm. I ended up really
badly damaging my back. And what saved
my life was the fact that the dispatcher
in there knew that we had a bail
commissioner dealing with an arrest that
I had. And that dispatcher had the sense
to call, his name is Cal Pressman and
say, "The sergeant's in a really bad
fight. He needs help."
If that was Marramat County or handover,
they're not going to have that type of
knowledge or even think outside the box
like that. If it was not for Cal coming
over to help me that night, I probably
would not be here. I ended up with a
life sentence of a bad back. He ended up
with a three-year prison sentence. I was
dispatching one night. We had an officer
in a fight on 103A and of the craziest
thing out of it a few years later, the
one person that happened to be here that
I called out was a bail commissioner who
was the closest person I had to go on a
103A to help the officer.
Uh, a dispatch elsewhere is not going to
have that. Then you go into many things
like when you're dealing with one
officer on the road, how many times do
you want that officer to come off the
road to come in to take reports of stuff
that doesn't need to be addressed with.
Now,
number two, if you do have an officer
on, we're the only 247 department miles
around here. If what I was presenting
when I was at that time the chief was
I'm not going to stick one officer out
here by himself at night with nobody
um nobody in in the police department,
nobody to help when they're downstairs
in the booking room. So why don't you
look at adding two more police officers
so you can have two police officers out.
Average police officer now has to be
running well over $100,000 with health
insurance and benefits is what I'm
guessing. Probably 110,000 maybe maybe
even more with health insurance. So,
when you're talking about a dispatch
center that's costing $600,000
that you're getting money back from
other towns, I would hope that somebody
would add into the added personnel that
you're going to need for somebody to
still sit at that window. You're still
going to want to have a daily dispatcher
to help you with those calls.
What are you going to do for the safety
of the officer on the midnights? I hope
you're not going to leave them here
working alone by themselves downstairs
in a booking room hoping that 80 miles
away somebody's watching the monitor to
see if the officer isn't an issue. And
an example that you could look at is
Newport within the past two years had an
officer being attacked and almost choked
out. The person that saved that Newport
officer's life was a dispatcher. Um, and
that was one of the big things about uh
changing how if you ever get a different
PD, how I was going to change things
there. Um,
we are always forgotten by Marramat
County. We have a sheriff's department.
Calling a sheriff to come down here,
which I'm not bashing the sheriff's
department, but I'm just saying calling
a Marramat County Sheriff's Department
is like asking them to go to Pittsburgh
or asking them to travel here. It is
such a far distance away to get help.
Um, so when you're in another dispatch,
you lose the continuity of your core
group of people. Um, I understand
somebody said here handover has to be
doing something right and they've added,
you know, all these departments, but to
handover, we're going to be the furthest
one south.
That that that's a that's a big distance
for them to be addressing.
Uh, just trying to look here. uh
examples of how our dispatch pulled
together. Um I was sitting home one
night. We had a little mini micro burst
come into town. Within 10 minutes, we
had 84 open 911 calls. 84 calls for
service was sitting on that computer.
And I think the chief can look that up.
We were able to get people into the
dispatch center. I was one of them
person sitting there. One of us was
dispatching on a toilet with a phone
because that's why it's there. But we
were able to get those people in here
and handle that. I don't know if in the
matter of a minute, however large the
station was up there, if they're dealing
with ice storms or mini bursts and it
affects other areas just outside of New
London, I don't think you're going to
get the response that they got from
here. Another wonderful thing that we
did is training. I know that for myself,
I put on, I think, five different active
shooter trainings. And not only was that
for the police, but that was also for
the dispatch. They were involved in our
training. I haven't heard of any other
center that puts forth the effort that
we did at that time of involving
dispatch in that type of training.
That's one of the benefits of a smaller
town um able to do that.
I'm just trying to look at some of my
notes here. Um,
I don't I don't want to sit here forever
and go through it, but I think that if
you would like to reach out to me, I'm
happy to provide the number uh to you to
go over uh many of the items I've
discussed tonight at greater detail to
include the 2014 um when we went through
that process of looking at changing the
dispatch centers. I would love to give
you the knowledge that I have. Like I
said, I cut my teeth downstairs as a
dispatcher. I worked my way up um from
part-time to full-time dispatching. Then
I went from dispatching to dispatch
supervisor and then ultimately to the
police chief. One of my projects that I
was involved in was writing all the
grants for the towers for Kier Sarge um
at that time. But there's a whole lot
more that needs to be looked at I think
on the police department side that might
be forgot. If you're looking at it just
as a dispatch center and the cost of
600,000 or $680,000,
how is that going to actually affect the
officers here and the work that they're
done? And what other things may you not
be thinking of that is going to have to
just transfer from the dispatch budget
over to the police department budget?
because I I I
just cannot see you leaving a single
officer out here in the middle of
nowhere at 2:00 in the morning praying
that when you're in the booking center
downstairs, somebody's sitting in
handover watching what's going on with
an array with a a right person or fights
because we could go on and on for hours
about the amount of issues that we've
dealt with from two broken jails uh door
cells blown out fights, struggles, um
all kinds of stuff. I think that that
history would be important and I would
be more than welcome to sit down um and
talk to you because I think I have a lot
of knowledge um in this area right down
to even costs um and the importance of
keeping dispatch here in town.
>> So,
>> thank you. I will probably take you up
on that.
>> Thanks, Ed.
Christy, did you have anything you
wanted to say? You're okay. Uh John
Ellis, did you have anything you wanted
to Nope. Okay. Well, I think uh we are
ending a little early. Uh which is
wonderful. We get you. We've got to do a
little wrap up here at the end. Okay,
Colin is back.
>> I I I
would just like to better appreciate
when you said shared services that we we
have a lot of shared services through
the other towns. Could you share with me
what you're thinking and what part of
them are dispatch related?
>> School districts.
>> School.
>> Okay. So, you're talking about things
other than dispatch. We also have
Tritown Assessing, which is a shared
department. Okay. Um, your is it your
public works?
>> Okay. No, I thought you were talking
about dispatch related or police related
stuff. Okay.
>> Thank you. Because I I think it's
important uh to lose comments and Ed's
comments that we
be very clear about what dispatch means
versus other functions that are going
on. when you look at the reports,
uh, you'll find things that are in the
reports that are happening at police
stations across the world that have
nothing to do with dispatch.
So, I think we need to differentiate
what's going on that's dispatch related
from what is not dispatch related and
then focus on the dispatch.
>> And can I go back to the comment you
made about shared services because I
think you were asking about within the
dispatch framework, correct? Sorry about
that. Yeah.
>> Um what's currently happening and it
impacts how they're dispatched as well
is fire services right now and this is
all over the country and probably all
over the world as you said typically
smaller towns even big cities can't pull
together a full complete response to
certain events without the help of other
agencies outside of their
municipalities. Happens in big cities
happens in small towns. So, if there
were a fire at the New London in, what
is going to be on those fire trucks when
they pull up? It's going to be everybody
that works at New London, but it's also
going to be all the towns around here.
So, that's one form of shared services,
mutual aid.
>> Mutual aid, right?
>> One thing that is unique to small towns
is the law enforcement part of mutual
aid. And larger metropolitan areas, it's
like the Great Wall of China. Law
enforcement shall not cross that wall
unless it's very extenduating
circumstances. In this type of
environment, they often back each other
up. So, it kind of doesn't matter what's
on the side of your car long as you show
up as another law enforcement officer to
back up this lone officer in this town
who's the only one. Kind of the
description that he was given about when
you're in this trouble and this dispatch
center can then send it. Yes, all of
these things can be done from anywhere.
You can go to another state and say, I
want the physical process of answering
my calls and dispatching functions to be
handled somewhere else. But it's all the
other things that aren't quantified or
qualified and that process that are
impacted by it. And then the decision
is, is it worth making the change? Is it
worth the cost? Because there's a cost
to making change. If you just look at
what does it cost us to pay someone else
to perform the service, you had to get
there. And to get there, there's a whole
lot of costs involved in that.
>> Yeah. I look forward to understanding
what you think those costs are. Yeah.
And I I think that what's important and
then I'll sit down is that we we
I hope that what you bring to the table
is to put a line of demarcation between
those actions that occur in the course
of a day that are directly linked to a
dispatch function from those actions
that happen in the course of the day
that are indirect link. dispatch might
be involved in doing a dispatch of
personnel for one thing or another and
and whether that dispatch center sits
here or handover or somewhere else you
know how does that change right so I
think that distinction is going to be
very important when we finally get down
to the to the bottom line
>> do my best to describe that because as I
said it's not wrong or right it's
different and what works for you guys
>> or what could work
>> what could work
>> right thank you.
>> Okay. Sure.
>> Oh, sure. Ed, come on up.
>> Oh, mic on.
>> Ed,
>> will you turn the mic on? Thank you.
>> I have another thing that I can offer
which is very rare, I would say, um, for
a police police officer. I am still
currently the goan New Hampshire police
chief. I've been there now for 33 years.
I was actually a dual chief for seven
years between the two towns which was
interesting. But I have had the
opportunity to have three different
dispatch centers in the town of Goan and
we currently operate under Southwest
Mutual aid fire and then I am dispatched
through Newport Police Department. The
only reason that we actually were one of
those towns that did leave here. The
reason why we left at the at the time
was um with the narrow banding getting
over Sun was hard. If Sonip was able to
put up, you know, a nice tower up in
there and get get on, I'd be very happy
to come back. Uh but with that said, um
I can tell you all the breakdowns
between fire and police. And I'm not
picking on fire or police. We're talking
strictly about dispatch centers. I can
tell you about how many times that I
wake up and find out that last night in
the town of Goan, somebody died of a
heart attack and I was never notified of
that call because Southwest forgot to
call Newport Dispatch.
That happens a lot more than you think
in larger agencies. Southwest is a very
large agency which you'll have the
opportunity I think to look at but a
little town of goan population of a
thousand a lot of times does not get
that phone call to Newport dispatch and
that is scary um to know that you know I
am just 11 minutes from town and that
I'm not receiving that uh call so I
think I have even a more knowledge in
this in that for 22 years of being a
full-time time police officer here. I
got to see what it's like to be split
dispatch
and a combined dispatch. And I can tell
you that minutes save lives. Um I have
two life- saving awards in town strictly
because I was able to see the 911
monitor, come up with a call in
dispatch, and get in a cruiser and be on
the way faster than 911 could actually
call. Because a lot of people may not
know this, but on 911, they'll send a
little thing to dispatch. Is that still
the same, Chief Cop? They'll send a
little message to dispatch and you can
just see there's a medical call four
miles down the road.
Jump in the cruiser, go flying down
there and find a lady choking on a
lobster tail. I was able to do that in
the time it took 911 to call New London
and New London to take the two minutes
required to send out the tone and I'm
doing the himuk maneuver down there and
then CPR and saving a life. You're not
going to get that type of service. So, I
know um what they're talking about just
concentrating on dispatch kind of felt
like it was a little bit forget about
what the police end needs,
but having that there is a major bonus
because that's just one call and there's
lots of calls that because of that
dispatch center being in there, we have
a one or two minute jump before a fire
department can be toned. Um, so again, I
just wanted to point that out to you
because I think I have a broader view of
what it's like to be with a split
dispatch center versus a combined
dispatch center. Thank you.
>> Thanks, Ed.
>> Okay. Well, thank you everybody for
coming. We will continue to provide
updates along the way as they become
available. Um and then we will at the
end of this um when Sherry has done her
work have uh a public
review session I guess of her report. So
more to come. Thank you all.