By MATTHEW PARRY
Parry@newsroom.byu.edu
The Provo 911 Dispatch Center will upgrade to a city-wide dispatch next month, giving emergency operators more room to maneuver and respond quicker to 911 calls.
'The 911 Center will go city-wide, meaning, it will cover not only fire, medical and police emergencies, but also field calls for power outages, traffic problems and flooded streets,' Ferre said.
Dispatchers moved from a cramped building within the police station to a location below the Provo Library on Dec. 9.
'Lots of mouse around this house,' Ferre said of the 24 high-tech computers within the center, each with a computer mouse.
Seven dispatchers work together at separate consuls, each with four computer monitors. One consul receives all 911 calls and directs the calls to one of the other six dispatchers, Ferre said.
The other dispatchers take charge of fire, medical or police problems. With a 911 call, the computer locates the address of the caller with a map and sends it directly to the nearest officers, he said.
'Every time they call 911, the computer contains the medical past of the people that live at the address,' Ferre said. 'If they are in a wheelchair, for example, it will say it.'
The computers also help to locate officers and make sure they are safe. If an officer's radio turns sideways from being in a skirmish, then an alarm sounds and dispatch can send help, Ferre said.
'The new system gives us better information from the 911 database when they call,' Ferre said. 'It is more accurate in locating people.'
In the past, BYU was a hard place to find people in distress. It was difficult for police officers to find buildings on campus, because students had a tough time giving directions on the phone, Ferre said.
'But now with the computer system, we pull up the address and send whoever is needed,' he said.
Upset by his car being burglarized, Jeffrey Tolley, a senior from Provo majoring in Law and Diplomacy, called the police dispatch.
'They were great! Right on the ball! The dispatch lady was nice when I called and there was an officer within the hour. They have a really neat computer in their car and the new dispatch center sends the information to them instantly. It really improves my respect for the law,' Tolley said.
By making the system 'city-wide,' dispatchers hope to fix power outages, clear street floods and move accidents out of the way quicker.
'Soon we will install huge screens that tell us when traffic slows down,' Ferre said. 'Instantly we'll know that there is an accident, and we can clear it quickly.'