Emergency Response Aligned for Large CAD Consortium
May 13, 2024 by Kate Nadolski
With more than 1,700 incoming emergency calls per day, the Summit County CAD Consolidated Consortium in Ohio has a lot to manage. Summit County has a team of more than 100 dispatchers within three dispatch centers to provide services for 16 police departments and 14 fire departments.
At one point, many of these public safety agencies were on different public safety systems, creating a massive barrier for the 911 center, as they were unable to streamline dispatching processes.
Some agencies were using locally developed technology, while others were on a smaller, outdated solution. Nonetheless, information was not being transferred from the dispatchers to police and fire efficiently.
CAD System Administrator Michael Banks with Summit County said this challenge was causing slower response times and creating frustrations in the overall emergency response process.
“We couldn’t consolidate our dispatch center without one single solution. It’s hard for individual cities to be prepared to continue managing the changing technology and staffing,” Banks said.
Summit County set sights on a large project to elevate communication and information sharing by implementing Tyler Technologies’ Enterprise Public Safety solutions. After the majority of agencies migrated to the integrated solution, processes have been streamlined.
“About 70% of the county has been consolidated. These bigger agencies have been able to move off their dying platforms and transition into integrated technology that works the same for everyone involved in the consortium,” Banks explained.
The agency’s ability to work off one common platform enabled emergency telecommunicators to seamlessly transfer their duties from their old center to their new center, resulting in improved workflow through setting up robust recommendations, interfacing with ProQA, and utilizing alerts to decrease response times.
The benefits trickled down to those in the field, according to Banks.
“First responders were able to utilize the CAD web view and mobility solutions to improve situational awareness and elevate their level of service,” Banks said.
Along with mobile capabilities in the field, digitizing forms and sharing information seamlessly has been a game changer to meet mandatory requirements for Marsy’s Law, which seeks to give crime victims meaningful and enforceable constitutional rights equal to the rights of the accused.
Summit County has aligned their approach to emergency response to better serve their community. While the progress and benefits have been plentiful, the county’s long-term vision is to keep going until every agency is consolidated into one solution. This strategic alignment aims to further enhance emergency response efforts and maximize public safety.