San Francisco's crime dispatch center answered just 72 percent of calls within 15 seconds in October, alarming new statistics show.
The number released by the Division of Emergency Management is the lowest of any month in the past six years and is below the department's goal of 95 percent.
Emergency officials on Tuesday attributed the decline to a decline in the number of full-time dispatchers since the COVID-19 pandemic and a concurrent increase in call volume.
“The situation here is certainly serious and it's not getting any better,” said veteran dispatcher Valerie Tucker in an interview with The San Francisco Chronicle this Tuesday.
The department currently receives nearly 2,000 calls daily, an average of 81 calls per hour.
An alarming new statistic shows that Francisco's 911 center answered only 72 percent of calls within 15 seconds in October
The department currently receives nearly 2,000 calls daily, an average of 81 calls per hour.
Emergency officials on Tuesday attributed the decline to a decline in the number of full-time dispatchers since the COVID-19 pandemic and a concurrent increase in call volume
Media outlets like the Chronicle have already reported on the city's acute staffing shortages and are still considering strategies such as equalizing dispatchers with emergency responders like police because of their status as a city.
Meanwhile, dispatchers have long been calling for an increase in staff. The current rush of calls has forced many of them to work mandatory overtime, often for months, several told the Chronicle.
“In 15 seconds, I can begin CPR instructions, have NARCAN administered, and give choking instructions to a new mother or father,” Tucker said of the declining response rate.
“I can stop a suicidal person from harming themselves because I say their name and they don't feel so alone anymore.”
However, her boss at the city's DEM, Mary Ellen Carroll, sang a different tune.
She said she was “optimistic” that things would improve in the new year because of recent changes in the department, such as the addition of an in-house recruiter and increasing workers' base pay to $104,000.
Additionally, the position requires only a high school diploma and includes union benefits.
Another embellishment is an attempt to speed up dispatcher background checks, which is already in the works, she said.
“For me, as the director of this organization, there is nothing more important right now than working on this issue,” said Carrol, who was appointed to her post as executive director in the summer of 2018
At the time of her appointment, her department employed approximately 280 people – more than twice as many full-time dispatchers as today.
The number released by the Division of Emergency Management is the lowest of any month in the past six years and is below the department's goal of 95 percent
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From March 2020 to December 2022, the company saw a decline from 155 to 123 – almost 40 fewer than the goal of 160 fully trained employees.
In her interview on Tuesday, Carroll said the number had since increased to 126, along with 14 trainees – “incremental progress,” she said.
But Tucker said she and others are feeling the seemingly endless flood of calls, which fell sharply in 2020 and 2021 but have since returned to pre-pandemic levels.
As call volumes increase, response times are only getting slower, statistics now show — and Tucker told the Chronicle that she and her fellow dispatchers are on the verge of burnout after months of longer hours and fewer breaks.
“Most of us in the room start [ask]'Is it worth it?' Tucker said as the city continues to grapple with an ongoing crime wave that has now stretched back years.
Tucker added that she fears that the inability to keep up with the flood of people represents a new status quo – a status quo created by the pandemic that, like San Francisco's crime situation, is now the norm.
San Francisco Dispatchers Union President Burt Wilson, a current dispatcher, also spoke to the publication and said detailed plans are currently in the works to address the city's hiring schedule.
Media outlets like the Chronicle have already reported on the city's acute staffing shortages and are still considering strategies such as equalizing dispatchers with emergency responders like police because of their status as a city
From March 2020 to December 2022, the company saw a decline from 155 to 123 – almost 40 fewer than the goal of 160 fully trained employees
Against this backdrop, crime remains a problem in what was once the Bay Area's crown jewel
Wilson said a bill still under consideration that would reclassify dispatchers as public safety employees could help ease the dispatcher shortage.
The hiring process in San Francisco currently takes an average of 255 days to find a dispatcher — a schedule further complicated by the time needed for training, which officials say is about a year.
Making matters worse, staff are not stepping in quickly enough to replace retiring or tired workers, leading Carroll to tell the newspaper that she will support “anything that helps get people into the workforce.” and keeping the really good people we have.” '
When contacted by The Chronicle, Mayor London Breed's office did not say why it did not reclassify 911 dispatchers as EMTs, a designation held by police officers and firefighters that comes with better benefits and a generous pension.
Regarding the staffing shortage, spokesman Jeff Cretan said, “It's not just a local issue.” This is a national issue.
He then reportedly reiterated that his boss remained focused on improving response time issues.
Against this backdrop, crime remains a problem in what was once the Bay Area's crown jewel.
According to statistics covering the entire year ending last Sunday, there was a 14.2 percent increase in robberies and a 15.6 percent increase in rapes compared to last year.
The number of homicides also remained unchanged at 53 compared to the previous year and is incredibly close to the number of homicides reported at the end of 2022 and 2021 – a total of 55.
This followed a 56-year low in 2019, when 41 people were killed in the city, a number that, like many other crime rates, appears to be a thing of the past following the pandemic.
Somewhat pessimistically, Wilson said of city officials: “They know it's a problem.”
“But unless someone important is killed or injured, they won't care.”