Photo Courtesy of Washington County

Hardworking individuals behind the scenes are recognized with National Public Safety Telecommunicators Week through April 19th. Cara Sorrells, Washington County 911 Supervisor, spoke with KCII News about the job, what happens when they receive a call, and the challenges and rewarding parts of the position, “We have 14 on staff. You can walk in off the street and it’s on the job training. It takes about five or six months to learn all of the different things you need to learn. We also have to go to the law enforcement academy for a 40 hour certification and there’s also a certification for emergency medical dispatch. We have protocols for everything. We have a simo-select we do on our radio system with an alert tone that tells everybody that should go to that accident they need to go. So, if you’re calling 911, one person is taking that call and asking the pertinent questions to get the important information and send the help you need. While they are doing that, the second person on the team is already paging out everyone you need to respond. Everyone likes helping people, that’s the bottom line. The most challenging part is when you can’t fix things, because 911 dispatchers are fixers. They want to send as many people as they can there right away to fix your problem. That is hard, when they’ve done everything they can do and it’s still not enough. A good day is when things go right. If you get someone who says, ‘someone just collapsed’ and you start CPR, they load them in the ambulance, they use their defibrillator, and that person is saved, that’s awesome. Those are the moments dispatchers live for!” 

There are 14 telecommunicators on staff in Washington County with more than 180 years experience combined answering calls from the public. They are Cara Sorrells, Sandy Lovetinsky, Teresa Todd, Melanie Larson, Shelley Reed-Wulf, Hunter Erwin, Delainey Parish, Riley Thomann, Rachel Kelly, Lydia Houston, Aspen Bromell, Kathryn Crumly, Rendee Campbell and Laura McDowell. Washington Police Chief Jim Lester also shared with KCII news, the relationship his department has with the telecommunications staff and how they work together to serve the county, “They are unseen heroes in our public safety world. They’re behind those headsets and they are the first point of contact when there’s an emergency. They gather the information, provide directions and then provide us the critical information we need to make things work. They’re vital! We appreciate what they do. We thank them and we’re proud to serve alongside them!”

To find out more about Telecommunicators Week and the work of those in Washington County listen to this week’s Jessica Yoder & Sarah Bigley with Kalona Realty Washington Page Programs with Sorrells.