NICENEWS : July 2006

Spotlight | Customer Perspectives | Technology Perspectives | Best Practices | News

San Francisco's 9-1-1 Center Keeps Emergencies at Bay

The San Francisco Emergency Communications Department (ECD) isn't your typical public safety operation. In fact, it's anything but ordinary. The department - which serves as the primary Public Safety Answering Point for the City and County of San Francisco - is housed in a specially designed, seismic-safe 35,000 square foot building located in the Civic Center area of San Francisco. Still, the true uniqueness of the ECD has much more to do with its internal operations than outward bricks and mortar. With a staff of over 150 telecommunicators, all civilians and all fully trained to handle any type of emergency, the San Francisco ECD is a model 9-1-1 operation.

San Francisco ECD's Carol Bernard, a 26-year public safety veteran, is quick to point out that while consolidated agencies are becoming the norm, there are very few that are completely managed by civilians, and fewer still where police, fire, and medical emergencies are processed from the first point of answer. "We're a City and County Department with enormous responsibility," she said. "We do a lot of big work."

The ECD takes more than a million police, fire and EMS calls a year. When it comes to handling those calls and coordinating emergency response, the center has no shortage of technology at its disposal, including a state-of-the-art 9-1-1 system, a trunked radio system, upgraded computer-aided dispatch (CAD) software, and mobile data terminals used by field responders. But it's the newest arrival to this 9-1-1 center - NICE's solution for managing emergency communications - that's helping to make short order of all of "the big work" that's done in the ECD's Client Services Section, managed by Bernard.

"The Client Services Unit plays an important role in helping the Department meet the expectations of all of its stakeholders," she said. "That includes citizens and community groups, our allied and partner agencies, and the court system."

As the ECD's Client Services Manager, Bernard oversees the ECD'S Quality Improvement team that is responsible for ensuring that quality standards are met in handling calls, and the Custodian of Records office, which is responsible for ensuring the integrity of the 9-1-1 records and handling records requests.

Cutting the backlog in half
The NICE solution captures all of ECD's 9-1-1 and non-emergency calls as well as communications from the Department's Motorola trunked radio system. Those communications can prove invaluable in reconstructing incidents for court use or internal reviews. The ECD's Custodian of Records office receives requests for audio recordings from district attorneys, public defenders, public safety and other city agencies, and private citizens.

"It's a very busy office," said Bernard. "We process over 300 requests a month." Using the Department's old digital audio tape (DAT)-based system, the two-person office found itself knee deep in requests. Since installing the new NICE solution, the office has been able to cut its backlog in half.

Bernard credits a number of features of the NICE solution, including online storage capabilities, with this productivity improvement. "In order to research requests before, we would have to first find the correct tape that covered the day we were searching, then load the tape, and rerecord onto another audio tape," she explained. "Since most of the requests come in after the fact, it always came down to searching for the tape, pulling it and then searching for the information from that tape. So it was cumbersome."

In contrast, with NICE the Department can capture all of its 9-1-1 and radio calls online, and store up to eighteen months' worth of recordings. The NICE solution's flexible search and replay features also aid in locating recordings and reconstructing incidents. For instance, the ECD's record custodians can search for captured 9-1-1 calls from specific phone numbers or locations, or by specific call-taking positions for other calls. Recorded radio transmissions can be retrieved by querying by radio dispatch positions, talkgroups and time frames.

"Now when we're trying to find a record, it takes about as long as it takes to enter the date and the time and the parameters we want," said Bernard. "It's pretty much instantaneous retrieval."

Once the relevant radio and phone recordings are found, the system automatically pieces them together in a graphical timeline so they can be seamlessly replayed. If copies need to be made for an attorney or other requesting party, the recordings can be saved on a CD as a single .wav file, eliminating the need to rerecord to an audio cassette in real-time. The .wav file recordings are time-stamped with precise time captured from the atomic clock to which the NICE solution is synched. "NICE is just head and shoulders above the other system we use to have," said Bernard.

Improvements in quality process yield improved "customer care"
Police, fire and EMS calls all come into and are dispatched from the consolidated center; and the ECD is well on its way toward ensuring that its telecommunicators are all universally (cross-functionally) trained and equipped to handle any type of call or dispatch - whether it requires a police, fire or EMS response.

The responsibility for ensuring quality call handling falls on the Quality Improvement Unit, and it's a job they take very seriously. "Our clients are first and foremost the public," Bernard affirmed, adding that "the public has high expectations when they dial 9-1-1."

The Quality Improvement Unit routinely reviews calls for service to ensure standards are being met. Under the old tape-based recording system, conducting quality reviews was a laborious process. "Before, the quality team would have to pull tapes to send to the supervisors," said Bernard. "Now, they can either quickly save the file to a CD or export it to a shared drive on our network." Bernard says that the NICE solution has gone a long way toward improving the quality assurance process. "Our Quality Improvement and Operations teams are able to review more calls," she said. "We can process a lot more work, more efficiently."

"It's a very busy office," said Bernard. "We process over 300 requests a month." Using the Department's old digital audio tape (DAT)-based system, the two-person office found itself knee deep in requests. Since installing the new NICE solution, the office has been able to cut its backlog in half.