Little Rock's 911 hub plans to have full staff in '18

Applicants top 50 after rise in wages, city manager says

Little Rock expects to fully staff its 911 call center by early 2018 after salary increases attracted more than 50 applicants to fill vacancies, a long-standing problem that has slowed emergency response, City Manager Bruce Moore said.

Moore approved a new pay structure in March that will cost the city about $258,000 per year to address the perennial challenge of hiring and retaining employees to handle 911 calls. He credited the change for raising interest in the positions and said City Hall has stopped accepting applications.

"We wanted to cut [applications] off so we don't raise expectations," Moore said. "We feel like we have enough to fill the current vacancies."

Call centers across the country have sought to overcome staffing shortages that can lengthen wait times for people facing emergencies.

Since 2012, at least one in four call center positions in Little Rock has been vacant at the end of each year, according to city data previously provided to the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. Earlier this year, 20 of 66 positions were empty.

No deaths have been attributed to Little Rock's vacancies, but the center has fallen short of national standards on how long the phone rings. Some residents have reported near-misses and frustration with trying to connect to dispatchers.

In January, for instance, Pamela Butler dialed 911 four times without success after a friend told her of plans to kill himself. Butler found the friend unconscious and resuscitated him, and ultimately someone else got through to the dispatch center.

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Ten people will begin training for call center positions within the next week in a shortened class. All of those candidates seek to move to Little Rock from call centers in other cities, Moore said. An additional 45 people are being considered for a second, normal-length class, Moore said.

Moore said all the positions should be filled by the first three months of 2018 after candidates complete the training courses and undergo background checks.

Employee shortages date back to at least 2005, when Little Rock Police Department leaders urged Moore to lift a citywide hiring freeze for call-taker positions. A year later, a new police chief wrote to Moore that the call center is "constantly faced" with employee turnover, and in 2008, the department said the center "has never been fully staffed."

Under the new pay scale, a call-taker's starting salary is $35,000, up from $28,494, and a first-time dispatcher will earn $43,000, up from $30,780.

Call-takers answer calls, collect information on reported incidents, categorize the nature of the call and pass it along to dispatchers, who send the proper responders to the scene. Call-takers can become dispatchers with additional training.

Those employees, plus the trainers and supervisors who also received pay bumps, will receive a 4 percent raise each year on their hire date up to their 10th year.

After that, they will receive a cost-of-living adjustment that will be determined by the city on a year-to-year basis. These raises are in addition to whatever across-the-board citywide pay increases officials may approve with the budget each year.

Starting salaries had previously increased by 11.5 percent since 2010, while the call center recorded a 56 percent rise in the number of calls it handles.

Metro on 07/27/2017

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