Various counties in the Triad are dealing with staffing shortages at their 911 call centers. | CDC/Unsplash
Various counties in the Triad are dealing with staffing shortages at their 911 call centers. | CDC/Unsplash
As the average number of operators per shift in the Davidson County emergency dispatch center has shrunk to half its normal staffing size or a little more, county leaders are considering changes to the dispatcher training academy in an effort to get new hires working faster.
Currently, the typical staff size is four or five when there should be eight people per shift, county manager Casey Smith told FOX 8 this week.
"It is low," he said. "There's no doubt it is low. We are taking the issue very seriously in terms of the staffing."
One solution is to shorten training to six weeks so dispatchers can get on the floor of the 911 center sooner.
Several factors are contributing to the staffing woes, and Smith expects things to get worse.
"We feel like probably the way the economy is going and the way the world is changed coming out of the pandemic, we may end up having a lot more turnover, not just in telecommunicator jobs but in other jobs in the county," he told Fox 8.
Until things turn around, the county is making short-term changes, assigning people to be on call to supplement staffing shortages as needed, the Fox 8 report said.
That, however, is driving up costs. The county has paid 911 employees more than $81,000 in overtime so far this year, Smith said. In 2021, dispatchers earned approximately $297,000 in overtime.
Thus far, the staffing shortfall has not affected response times, with dispatchers answering calls within 10 seconds 90% of the time, Smith said in the report. But he prefers a steady rate of six or seven people per shift, and pushing the trainees through will help with that.
"Shortening the time frame, but not doing it in a way that harms the amount of training you need to do the job, but maybe not making it quite as burdensome, so we can have folks come in and out of the academy…it's going to play a big role and be a big help," he said.
Neighboring counties are facing similar challenges, the Fox 8 report said. Alamance County is looking to hire one full-time telecommunicator, and Forsyth and Randolph counties each need four.
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