09/04/07
Scott Welton
SIKESTON — A lot of things have changed over the last 10 years for Scott County’s 911 dispatching center — some for the better, some not so much.
“Technology-wise, we are a lot more advanced,” said Joe Burton, emergency management director for Scott County and former E-911 administrator. “Financially, we’re a lot worse off.”
Burton assumed responsibility for the county’s emergency dispatching center in Morley on June 1, 1997.
“We actually went online on Sept. 11, 1997,” he recalled. “When we first opened 911 down there, we were an Enhanced 911 system.
We opened as an enhanced system, which means we got phone numbers and addresses for the call.
Not everybody does that — there are still counties in the state of Missouri that are not enhanced.”
The county’s 911 also started out with a GIS mapping system and the ability to receive cell phone calls, although with cell phone calls “we got a telephone number on the screen but nothing else,” Burton said.
Three or four years later, the county improved its GIS system, he recalled. “Around that point in time we upgraded and we started getting Phase 2 calls,” Burton said.
He explained with Phase 2, the 911 equipment is able to display which tower a cell phone call is coming from and even which side of the tower, narrowing down considerably the search area for callers who don’t tell dispatchers their location.
“About a year after that, we upgraded out 911 software,” Burton continued. “We also started answering some phase 3 calls.”
With Phase 3, latitude and longitude information is transmitted for cell phone calls so the location is plotted on a GIS map.
“At that point in time we were only the third county in the state that was doing that,” Burton said.
“We have stayed on the cutting edge of technology since we opened — and we still are on the cutting edge.”
In February 2006, the move of the dispatch center from Morley to the new Scott County Jail along with 911 software and GIS upgrades was completed.
Soon after, Burton handed off the 911 administration duties but continues to serve as mapping and GIS coordinator for the county’s E-911.
From desktop phones and radio sets to a completely computerized system, the county’s 911 has come a long way.
“I’m really proud of what Scott County has done as far as technology goes,” Burton said.
With the ability to track a variety of data from response times to the origins of aborted 911 calls, technological changes over the last decade have definitely been for the better, even if they do involve a steeper learning curve for administrators and dispatcher than when he started 10 years ago.
“The financial side is a little different,” Burton said. “Over these 10 years, we’ve seen wire line phones, which is what our tax base is built on, go away and people are using cell phones. Last year Scott County lost about $60,000 in revenue because of that. That doesn’t seem like a lot of money but when our budget is as small as it is anyway, $60,000 is a significant chunk.”
Burton explained there is no 911 tax on cell phones, even though the charge appears on some cell phone bills.
The question of how or why 911 charges are appearing on Missouri cell phone bills when no state or local agency is receiving any of the revenue was even asked at a recent state Senate committee hearing a couple of weeks ago, Burton said: “Nobody knows for sure where that’s going.”
Missouri voters have rejected all attempts to add a 911 tax to cell phone bills so far.
“Quite frankly, the time is coming that the citizens of this county and the citizens of Missouri are going to have to make a decision on whether they want this service or not, because that is what it is going to boil down to,” Burton said. “911 basically is just like any other business: if the revenue is not there, you can not keep it open.”
Providing E-911 services is “not getting any cheaper; it’s getting more expensive every year,” Burton said.
With or without a 911 tax for cell phones, Burton believes a change is needed keep 911 dispatching viable in the future.
“I think the time has come — not only financially, but for better protection for the citizens — that we need to look at regional dispatching,” he said.
One centralized 911 dispatching center could effectively service “three, four, five counties,” Burton said. “It could even be bigger than that.”
Wednesday, September 5, 2007
Saturday, September 1, 2007
Missouri County Keeps 911 Tax Rate at 10 Percent
County Keeps 911 Tax Rate at 10 Percent
By Sarah Wienke , Missourian Staff Writer
The county will be able to establish a central countywide 911 system without raising the telephone tax rate for emergency 911 services.
The Franklin County Commission Thursday set the 2008 E911 tax at 10 percent, the same rate since 2003.
"I think we can complete the project with what we have in place," said Emergency Management Agency Director Bob Dopp.
Dopp has recommended keeping the tax at 10 percent and using the money in the county's 911 fund to pay for new equipment.
The fund, which is made up of revenue from the 911 tax on landline phone bills, has a current balance of $830,000.
In 1992, county voters approved a tax ceiling of 15 percent, but the county has never collected that maximum.
Rates have varied from 6.5 percent to 11 percent since the tax was established.
Presiding Commissioner Ed Hillhouse said he looked at figures from the clerk's office, the treasurer's office and the auditor's office to make sure a 10 percent tax rate will cover the cost of operating a countywide 911 system.
Dopp said he has researched other counties in Missouri that have shifted to a similar countywide 911 plan to get an idea of how much it will cost.
The ballpark figure for equipment and updates is $700,000, he said.The county's consultant said the cost could be as much as $1 million, but officials think that figure is too high.
"This is the taxpayers' money," Dopp said. "We have to show them that we are spending it in a good way, not spending money where we don't need to."GeoComm, based out of Minneapolis, Minn., has developed a plan that will link city communication centers with a county dispatch center so fewer 911 calls have to be transferred to the appropriate dispatchers.
"We're working closely with fire departments and police departments to make sure the new system will match their systems," Dopp said. A subcommittee of EMA officials and representatives of each PSAP has been formed to guide the process and "look at the total picture."
The plan is to establish a Franklin County Emergency Communications Center in the sheriff's office.
That center will house law enforcement dispatchers, 911 call takers and fire and emergency services dispatchers.
911 calls from Union, St. Clair and unincorporated areas will be processed at the county's 911 dispatching center.
Pacific, Sullivan and Washington will continue to operate their own dispatching centers, or Public Safety Answering Points (PSAPs), but will be equipped with common technology that interfaces with the county's new equipment.
This will be Computer Aided Dispatch (CAD) and 911 technology.
The CAD will be outfitted with mapping technology so that every call will plot onto a GIS map.
The PSAPs will be connected to the county communications center.All of the equipment will be 100 percent paid for with the 911 tax.
"Right now, we can't identify the location of 911 calls from cell phones," Dopp said.
The new, enhanced system will identify on a map where the call is coming from, increasing response time.
More than 60 percent of the county's 911 calls come from cell phones. "Dispatchers spend a lot of time trying to figure out where the call is coming from," he said.
Additionally, the county is losing tax revenue as people shift from landlines to cell phones.
Currently no tax is collected on cell phone bills to cover wireless 911 calls. Missouri is the only state in the country that does not have a state wireless service recovery fee in place to fund wireless 911 calls.
Dopp hopes that will soon change.Earlier this month, Dopp formed a delegation of county emergency officials to go to the state Capitol to meet with members of the House and Senate to lobby for changes to the way tax is collected for 911 calls.
During the two-day hearing, officials from throughout the state told legislators the financial impact Missouri counties are facing with declining revenues and how passing a surcharge for wireless calls would benefit 911 systems.
The state's public safety director, Mark James, recommended a 75-cent monthly fee per cell phone number, which would generate about $33.8 million a year to be shared among counties.
"That would help us fund our equipment and staff," Dopp said.If legislators don't pass a cell phone tax, Franklin County may have to raise the telephone emergency 911 tax rate in the future, Dopp said. "But I can't see raising that tax right now," he said, noting that each 1 percent increase only gains the county an additional $65,000 for 911 services.
By Sarah Wienke , Missourian Staff Writer
The county will be able to establish a central countywide 911 system without raising the telephone tax rate for emergency 911 services.
The Franklin County Commission Thursday set the 2008 E911 tax at 10 percent, the same rate since 2003.
"I think we can complete the project with what we have in place," said Emergency Management Agency Director Bob Dopp.
Dopp has recommended keeping the tax at 10 percent and using the money in the county's 911 fund to pay for new equipment.
The fund, which is made up of revenue from the 911 tax on landline phone bills, has a current balance of $830,000.
In 1992, county voters approved a tax ceiling of 15 percent, but the county has never collected that maximum.
Rates have varied from 6.5 percent to 11 percent since the tax was established.
Presiding Commissioner Ed Hillhouse said he looked at figures from the clerk's office, the treasurer's office and the auditor's office to make sure a 10 percent tax rate will cover the cost of operating a countywide 911 system.
Dopp said he has researched other counties in Missouri that have shifted to a similar countywide 911 plan to get an idea of how much it will cost.
The ballpark figure for equipment and updates is $700,000, he said.The county's consultant said the cost could be as much as $1 million, but officials think that figure is too high.
"This is the taxpayers' money," Dopp said. "We have to show them that we are spending it in a good way, not spending money where we don't need to."GeoComm, based out of Minneapolis, Minn., has developed a plan that will link city communication centers with a county dispatch center so fewer 911 calls have to be transferred to the appropriate dispatchers.
"We're working closely with fire departments and police departments to make sure the new system will match their systems," Dopp said. A subcommittee of EMA officials and representatives of each PSAP has been formed to guide the process and "look at the total picture."
The plan is to establish a Franklin County Emergency Communications Center in the sheriff's office.
That center will house law enforcement dispatchers, 911 call takers and fire and emergency services dispatchers.
911 calls from Union, St. Clair and unincorporated areas will be processed at the county's 911 dispatching center.
Pacific, Sullivan and Washington will continue to operate their own dispatching centers, or Public Safety Answering Points (PSAPs), but will be equipped with common technology that interfaces with the county's new equipment.
This will be Computer Aided Dispatch (CAD) and 911 technology.
The CAD will be outfitted with mapping technology so that every call will plot onto a GIS map.
The PSAPs will be connected to the county communications center.All of the equipment will be 100 percent paid for with the 911 tax.
"Right now, we can't identify the location of 911 calls from cell phones," Dopp said.
The new, enhanced system will identify on a map where the call is coming from, increasing response time.
More than 60 percent of the county's 911 calls come from cell phones. "Dispatchers spend a lot of time trying to figure out where the call is coming from," he said.
Additionally, the county is losing tax revenue as people shift from landlines to cell phones.
Currently no tax is collected on cell phone bills to cover wireless 911 calls. Missouri is the only state in the country that does not have a state wireless service recovery fee in place to fund wireless 911 calls.
Dopp hopes that will soon change.Earlier this month, Dopp formed a delegation of county emergency officials to go to the state Capitol to meet with members of the House and Senate to lobby for changes to the way tax is collected for 911 calls.
During the two-day hearing, officials from throughout the state told legislators the financial impact Missouri counties are facing with declining revenues and how passing a surcharge for wireless calls would benefit 911 systems.
The state's public safety director, Mark James, recommended a 75-cent monthly fee per cell phone number, which would generate about $33.8 million a year to be shared among counties.
"That would help us fund our equipment and staff," Dopp said.If legislators don't pass a cell phone tax, Franklin County may have to raise the telephone emergency 911 tax rate in the future, Dopp said. "But I can't see raising that tax right now," he said, noting that each 1 percent increase only gains the county an additional $65,000 for 911 services.
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