County 911 Director discusses training and staffing at advisory board meeting

Laclede County 911 Director James Falls reported ongoing training and increased staffing in his department during Tuesday’s 911 Advisory Board meeting. The board meeting centered around Falls’ report and adjacent discussion. Board Chair Jerry Harrison (Lebanon Police Department Chief) also provided copies of the board’s recommended training program, which he noted would be useful to gain an understanding of what goes into the profession even if it were not immediately implementable. In Falls’ report, he said that dispatchers during the month of February handled approximately 64 incidents during a 12-hour shift. Since October’s consolidation of city and county dispatch, Falls said there was a 58 percent in call volume in county dispatch. This increase was expected due to the predicted traffic the merger would bring. In training, Falls said the department has paid their Association of Public-Safety Communications Officials’ membership dues, which are in year one of the recommended training program and will provide discounts on training and certifications. Falls noted that while previously there were three separate APCO membership accounts under the county’s name, there is now one consolidated account in use. Operations manager Brooklyn Newell is currently undergoing a critical incident response peer support specialist training program in Waynesville, which is paid for by the state. Peer support specialists are trained to provide support and resources to peers following potentially traumatic incidents. Dispatchers have also been trained with Compass Health on providing 988 services and recognize calls to transfer to the 988 hotline, which is a suicide and crisis line. The department will be in a communications loop with Compass Health once the call handoff is made. For more on this story, see Saturday's LCR.