Deseret News | Audit calls Salt Lake County 911 system inefficient

Reader comments
Audit calls Salt Lake County 911 system inefficient

kobalt | 10:24 a.m. Nov. 11, 2009

Last week, my next door neighbor, who is a police officer, suffered a major heart attack. I was told that it took 15 minutes to simply get someone to answer the call !!! My neighbor "flat-lined" in the ambulance,and his wife was told that if it were 5 minutes later ,he would be gone. 15 minutes to get someone to answer the phone at 911?

kobalt | 10:34 a.m. Nov. 11, 2009

Just a correction to my previous comment... When the ambulance got there, they said that he could not have been saved if they were 5 minutes later, and then he "flat-lined" in the ambulance. Fortunately he made it and responded well to surgery.

I find the above... | 11:51 a.m. Nov. 11, 2009

...story very hard to believe.

I've had to call 911 in both Salt Lake City and Salt Lake County several times, I've never waited more than 30 seconds for the call to be answered.

Comments continue below

Dale | 12:31 p.m. Nov. 11, 2009

As a former dispatcher for SLC I can say that the above story is very true. VECC as an effective 911 center is laughable at best. They do have high wait times for people on 911 due to their understaffing for the large area of Salt Lake County they cover. Compare that Salt Lake City has 5 call takers to cover just salt lake city proper, and vecc has 8 dispatchers to cover all of salt lake county minus salt lake city.

It's funny it's taken this long to notice the problems with VECC, not to mention the large number miss transfers to the wrong agency VECC is notorious for.

Similiar incident | 1:28 p.m. Nov. 11, 2009

I've called the SLC police recently due to serious noise complaints which lasted until 5-6 AM before they all passed out. Called 3 times, nobody ever showed up. Instead, there were cops just outside giving tickets to speeding cars... Ridiculous.

Mike | 2:48 p.m. Nov. 11, 2009

Close down the Sheriff Office dispact center as it is basically redundant and not needed and put all the personel at VECC. VECC would work better with proper staffing and the only reason the Sheriff wants his own dispach center is for power/turf reasons. Same thing with Salt Lake.

I guess they are afraid that if we share services, we might get a metro police department in Salt Lake Valley. Which would be a good thing. Get rid of private armies that mayors want. You want incompetence, get pulled over by a Cottonwood Heights, Midvale, or Taylorsville cop. Just three of the PD's that are not needed.

Bill | 3:35 p.m. Nov. 11, 2009

Take a look at the audit and see how much it cost to run VECC. It is out of sight and ONLY going to go up with no added services. The Sheriff's Office is almost half VECC's costs and more effective. Ask a Cop or Fireman who is better??

mark | 8:12 p.m. Nov. 11, 2009

Mike, you are absolutely correct, Salt Lake's dispatch center as well as the Sheriffs need to be merged with VECC.

Dale, I don't know how long ago you worked for City Dispatch, but I assure you that your numbers and information about VECC are quite inaccurate. Pointing fingers at other agencies is a childish thing to do. Would you like me to tell you about times City Dispatch has messed up? Cause I sure could. But I won't because, hey, things happen.

And also, tell you what, you say that VECC has high wait times? Oh yeah? So tell us what those times are. The information is available. Back up what you said Dale. Or quit slinging mud.

The dispatchers in this valley, at every agency, do a great job, and I want to thank them all. They have a very difficult job.

All the dispatch centers do a very good job. For efficiency, though, and to avoid the problems that this audit brings up, Salt Lake County must have just one dispatch agency and VECC is poised to be that agency.

Anonymous | 8:28 p.m. Nov. 11, 2009

Look even futher at how ineffective 911 is after you call. Why does each city have to try and do their own thing? It costs tax payers (all of us) more money to duplicate services that would be better provided by a metro dept. It will never happen because the cities want their domain.

Utah EM | 9:08 p.m. Nov. 11, 2009

Mark and Mike, what happens if the VECC dispatch center goes down? Who backs them up? The need for a redundent system is one of the basic tenets to emergency management preparedness. We need VECC, SLC dispatch and the Sheriff's Office. An additional solution to combining these centers is to add the 911 capabilty to the Sheriff's Office dispatch. Then we will have 3 systems in the valley for continuity of operations and there would be little delay for the Sheriff's Office dispatching.

Finally Mark, take a look at the audit and answer me why VECC cost so much to operate?? It is almost double per employee what SLC and Sheriff cost. And if the recommended true costing is added at VECC, cost for the agencies will go up, again.

(I work in Emergency Management for a city)

John | 9:52 p.m. Nov. 11, 2009

Good thing I never call... what was that number again?

Dale | 11:17 p.m. Nov. 11, 2009

I don't need to back up what I said the evidence is clear as mud on the wall. The Audit shows that VECC is not effective in their ability to dispatch for the sheriff’s department which covers a large part of the county area.

As for levels of mistakes, I have spend time in both SLC and VECC's dispatch centers. And I have watch VECC dispatchers fumble on addresses and proper jurisdictions. Not to mention their CAD doesn't help with address verification like the system SLC uses.

I agree that both agencies make their mistakes; the question is efficiency and public safety. VECC clearly is not pulling its weight on providing the pubic safety it should be for the price tag it has.

wet | 11:30 p.m. Nov. 11, 2009

This is a very serious issue. I am glad to read that the Sheriff's office seems to be taking this as such.

All too often, independent audits get swept under the carpet at tax payer expense.

Y'all missing a big point | 8:57 a.m. Nov. 12, 2009

The concern was double interviews for ONLY those calls dispatched to the Sheriff's Office. Again 14% of total. That means the other 86% of calls typically get handled. Those citizens getting shafted by the duplicative (and mostly unecessary IMHO) SO dispatch are well-served by VECC for fire/medical dispatch.

Adding 911 direct service to the SO dispatch would be a nightmare logistically, and cause many more duplicitive interviews than simply 14%! Redundancy for blackouts or computer issues is already handled by SLC dispatch. If a 3rd center is needed, it should be built by a simple geographic area, not by the wildly screwy borders of unincorporated SL County!

VECC needs much better financial oversight to be sure. That can be accomplished without a shutdown of services.

Just remember - the core "problem" here is that the County chose to NOT join in the program in 2001. That decision domino'd into the situation we have today. Unincorporated citizens have only their elected officials to blame.

mark | 1:07 a.m. Nov. 13, 2009

Dale, as clear as mud on the wall? Really? Mud on the wall is not very clear at all.
Sounds like you have an axe to grind about VECC. Sounds personal.

Anyway, person who claims that s/he is in emergency management, merging, of course, would not mean that all dispatching would have to come out of the same center.

If you are in emergency management, like you claim, then you obviously realize that there are already redundancies built into the system at VECC.

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Jason Olson, Deseret News

Tammy McAfee, front left, mans a dispatch station at the Valley Emergency Communications Center. VECC dispatchers have to transfer certain calls to the sheriff's division.