By
Scott Thomas Anderson
They never know what to expect when they pick up the phone.
Sometimes it's a desperate, wailing voice. Sometimes it's an individual venting rage or frustration. Sometimes its a confused person lost in a haze of dementia. And sometimes it's a frantic jumble of static-laden words that could mark the difference between life and death.
Every time emergency dispatchers from the Amador County Sheriff's Office get on the line, they have to navigate tense situations with a steady mind and confident air. They also have to muster help instantly for their callers.
Locally, all emergency calls to the Amador County Sheriff's Office, every municipal police department and American Legion Ambulance Service are handled by the Amador County Sheriff's Office Communication Center. Fire calls, accident and DUI tips are also routed directly through this center to other agencies. This year, the California 9-1-1 Emergency Center audited Amador sheriff dispatchers and found they answered 99.4 percent of their emergency calls within 10 seconds of receiving them. The percentage was significantly higher than the state average of 90 percent.
"I'm not sure exactly why we came in higher," said dispatcher Cathy Fulton. "All I can say is that we do this job because we want to help people and we take that responsibility very seriously. Trying to have an instant response to 911 calls is our main goal."
In addition to fielding emergencies, the dispatchers have other crucial tasks, including collecting data on arrest warrants, helping assemble SWAT, Search and Rescue and the narcotics task force and routing safety issues to various public works departments when city offices are closed.
For Fulton, monitoring arrest warrant information is often on her mind because it affects officer safety. "The police officers and sheriff's deputies are like our family here," she reflected. "It's our job to alert them if they're coming across an individual with a criminal history who might be carrying a firearm or prone to resisting arrest. We do everything we can from where we sit to help keep them safe and make sure they go home each night."
Being a dispatcher takes a skill set that's gradually built over time, said 26-year veteran Holly Durrett. "We get to know all too well what a domestic violence situation sounds like over the phone," Durrett said. "Sometimes a victim calls for help and then can't tell you everything because an attacker is near them. You have to learn to be a detective according to what you're hearing - you have to know when someone's being prevented from talking and what kind of questions you need to ask them."
In terms of handling a medical crisis, Durrett said dispatchers have to respond with a simultaneous blend of protocol and instinct. "I would say most of the decisions we make when a call comes in, we make within three to five seconds," she observed.
Amador County Sheriff Martin Ryan said he was extremely proud of how his communication center, which is staffed with nine full-time dispatchers and two part-time dispatchers, scored in the audit. He praised his dispatchers' technical proficiency, calming demeanor and ability to multi-task as highly stressful events unfold. He called their overall performance "excellent."
The dispatchers themselves are more modest about their ranking. "It's a challenging job," Fulton said. "That's what it's really about. You get your adrenaline rushing, then you take a deep breath and wait for everything to happen again."
