Dispatching; a voice you will never forget

During the month of April, the Vernon County Sheriff's Office will be recognizing national tele-communicators week for our dispatchers in Vernon County.

The job of dispatching is often overlooked and even taken for granted. When a person calls 911 they expect someone to answer and be ready to deal with their issue no matter what the circumstances. It can be easy to forget the person on the other end is a human being that can be affected by stress, emotions, and fatigue just like everyone else.

Dispatchers are the center of the emergency world. They take the first call of the person in need, they decide who should be notified, who needs to respond, and they relay vital information to those who are responding. The role of a dispatcher is not easy and just like the many first responders who arrive at the scene, dispatchers work through incidents that will affect them for the rest of their lives.

It is often the assistance given to people by the dispatchers that makes the difference between life and death. Talking someone out of committing suicide, keeping someone awake and alert while responders are in route, and getting valuable information to law enforcement before they arrive on scene at calls that have become violent are all stressful situations for everyone involved.

I once saw a poster in a dispatch room that read, "Always remember that it's your voice in the darkness that gives hope to those who really need it."

While attending a sheriff's conference, I had the privilege of hearing a detective from a large city speak about a call he responded to where the suspect had come out of a house and opened fire on him and his partner before they could even make it out of their car. He had managed to get his door open but never even got his seatbelt off before the suspect shot him multiple times just before shooting and killing his partner.

As he told the story and relayed all the thoughts that went through his mind while he lay in the car unable to move, I remember him making the comment that he was putting all his hope in his dispatch as he heard them call him on the radio over and over attempting to perform a status check on him. Once he heard the call go out that he was not responding, he knew they would be sending him help, but what he would never forget was the sound of the dispatcher's voice call out his badge number over the radio and say, "if you can copy us, we have help on the way."

When someone is in the seat of a dispatcher, they do not have the luxury of taking a break because a call was stressful, or because they were friends and co-workers with the person who is no longer responding on the radio. There is no time to be upset, no time to show your emotions, and there is never a time to be afraid. They must push all that aside and continue to take the next emergency call that is coming in and make sure the next person in danger receives the help they need.

When an emergency call is resolved due to the combined efforts of the emergency responders, the dispatchers involved are often overlooked and remain in the background, continuing with the next call behind the scene. I want to take a moment to thank all of our dispatchers for the job they do and the lives they save. Even if they do not hear it enough, they do not go unnoticed.