Brian Barber, World Staff Writer

911, do you need police, fire or medical? The sometimes-long wait to hear those words from an emergency operator has Tulsa residents complaining. “It’s a public safety issue,” Council Chairwoman Maria Barnes said.

“A friend of mine called 911 because lightning struck one of her trees, setting it on fire. The phone rang and rang. It was answered, and she was transferred. And it rang and rang again. What if it had been her house on fire?”

The City Council recently wrapped up a task force – led by Barnes and Councilor Bill Christiansen – that has made recommendations to the administration to help alleviate the situation. Many are already in the works.

“We need to take immediate action,” Christiansen said. “With a lot of these calls, people’s lives are at stake.”

Ken White, 911 Center operations manager, said every call should be answered “within seconds.” “But there are different factors that can affect that,” he said. “We need to look at how all of these calls can be handled in a more efficient fashion.”

Everyone seems to agree 911 employees are not to blame. The delays have to do with a manpower shortage and nonemergency calls clogging up the lines. Of White’s 80 budgeted staff for the 24/7 operation, he’s got 11 positions vacant.

There’s high turnover because it’s a stressful job, White said. “People need to realize that this is not simply a job where you answer a call, take some information and then answer the next call, with everything being calm,” he said. “The callers often have been the victims of a crime or have fire or medical emergencies. Unfortunately, some of our employees take the brunt of the frustration, fear and anger that are being felt. “It gets to you. People are human.”

And the pay is not comparable with that of peer cities. An entry-level 911 employee makes $11.98 per hour, which is $3 to $4 less than in other cities.

Many get trained in Tulsa and end up taking their skills to a better-paying operation. Statistics show that many leave within the first year of taking the job, Interim Informations Technology Director Tom Golliver said. “I think it’s due to stress and the feeling that there’s a lot more to the job than they are getting paid for,” he said.

The administration is in negotiations with the union to raise the salary level. One of the council’s recommendations is to do just that.

Another major issue is that of the roughly 2,000 calls answered daily by the 911 Center, nearly half aren’t for emergencies. But people dial 911 anyway because they aren’t familiar with the nonemergency numbers. Also, with everyone having a cellphone in their hands, getting reports about the same situation has added to the call load, White said. “Once, when there was a grass fire off the highway, we got literally dozens of calls coming in,” he said. “Every one of them takes time to process. Technology is great and has come a long way, but it still can’t listen to a person and determine what service is needed when they call 911.”

Hang-ups are also an issue because then the operator has to call the number back and make sure no one needs help, White said. “We want to stress to people: Stay on the line. We are getting to you as quickly as we can,” he said.

The long-range plan that the city’s Management Review Office is working on as part of the KPMG efficiency review is to establish a 311 number to take nonemergency calls. Already set up is the new Customer Care Center (918-596-2100) to handle certain types of calls, but it is not a 24/7 operation, and the employees are not trained for all kinds of calls yet. That, however, is the ultimate goal, MRO Director Vickie Beyer said. “We are not quite there yet with the 311 project, but we are looking at it hard,” she said, adding that the costs and technology have to be studied. “It’s a priority because getting people to dial three numbers rather than 10 would be easier.”

The council task force has recommended a 311 number to alleviate the 911 Center’s work load. But as a temporary measure, it is suggesting that a couple of the vacant 911 positions be transferred to animal welfare to take calls at all hours. Now the animal line rolls over the 911 after hours, and many calls are received about strays in neighborhoods.

Finally, the council task force has recommended the administration boost the Police Department’s manpower. “Bottom line, we need more police officers because that’s the end result of most of the 911 calls,” Christiansen said.

The department has 749 sworn personnel, which is down nearly 100 from two years ago. Mayor Dewey Bartlett last week announced he is moving up the next police academy from April 2012 to this December and is considering another academy later in the fiscal year. Police management is also in the process of civilianizing 17 positions that are now held by uniform officers to put those officers into the field. The timing of the council task force’s report is good, Beyer said, because “it shows the council has a lot of interest in this, as does the administration.”

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