There will still be humans answering 911 calls, Capt. Matt Franke told commissioners Monday, but computers will handle the initial dispatching process.
Currently, a call-taker answers the phone and routes it to a dispatcher to complete the call and get emergency crews on the road, according to Franke.
Under the new system, a computer would make the initial call to the fire department.
“Once they (medics) are in the ambulance and leaving the station, they are talking to a real live human being and if the citizen is on the phone and if they are still giving instructions, that’s a real live human being,” Franke told the Journal-News.
“The only change would be that initial announcement either over the station alerting or over the volunteer fire pagers that would be an automated message,” he said.
There could be savings as the county’s population grows, he said, because the automation would eliminate the need to add personnel.
No current dispatch staffers are being replaced by the technology, according to Franke.
The county teamed up with fire departments in 12 jurisdictions to apply for the Local Government Innovation Program grant.
Franke estimated it will cost $300,000 to get the county dispatch center outfitted with the technology, leaving about $200,000 to get fire stations up and running on the system.
The estimate is $20,000 per fire station for the equipment.
Commissioner Don Dixon suggests townships or villages who put up matching money should get priority to participate in the program.
Morgan Twp. Fire Chief Jeff Galloway, who used to be the county emergency management director, said he worked with this system for years when he was with Palm Beach County.
“I’m used to the system, I used it for many years in South Florida,” he said. “It’s a very good system that will speed up and expedite the paging of calls to the fire departments for sure.”
While Fairfield Twp., Hamilton and Oxford are also partners, they are in the process of getting their own grants. The county dispatches for those jurisdictions, but cities like Middletown dispatch their own emergency crews.
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