Cape Girardeau County 911 to improve handling of cellphone calls

Final contracts were signed Monday by the Cape Girardeau County Commission that will help 911 services take advantage of wireless and Internet technology.

Missouri ranks last in the United States in making accommodations for cellphones and Cape Girardeau County's outdated system responds to users more slowly than it could, said Richard Knaup, county emergency management director. He was joined by Todd Karl from AT&T to explain system shortfalls and how upgrades will benefit emergency services.

"Seconds are precious," Knaup said. "Seconds can be like hours when it's your loved one that needs help."

Up to 68 percent of the calls to the three Primary Safety Answering Points, or PSAPs, in the county are from cellphones. Their calls are routed to the regular Cape Girardeau Police Department number and callers must specify if it is an emergency. Unlike calling on a land line, the location of the caller is unknown and dispatch must take time to verify the address.

With the fully implemented upgrade, emergency services will be able to pinpoint callers on a map. The technology is already widely available to cellphone providers. Customers can pay for plans that track their phones, even when turned off. That has been made available to emergency services in some situations, such as missing persons, but locating and tracking the phone can take up to 45 minutes in the best case.

The upgrades also make possible the use of laptops in police cars that can be directly linked to 911 calls. Cape Girardeau city and the county sheriff's department are set to bring laptops online. Jackson is not yet ready to proceed with using computers on patrol, Knaup said.

Next-generation services, in which callers will be able to use text messages and social media like Facebook to contact 911, are in experimental phases nationwide.

The total cost of the plan is about $880,000, which will come out of 911 funding.

In Missouri only land lines bear the monthly surcharge that pays for 911. The decline in hard-wired phone lines means less funding. Efforts to levy surcharges on cellphones have died in the state Senate. In 17 Missouri counties, 911 is so drained that calls from land lines cannot be located, according to a 2011 House of Representatives study.

The county 911 fund will be depleted by the upgrades, but some of the existing equipment is so old that there are not parts available to fix it.

"We have to move on," said Knaup. "We are stunting ourselves staying where we are at."

Comp-time buyout

In other business, a one-time comp-time buyout was approved for sheriff's office employees for up to $128,902, clearing time that for some employees has been accumulating for 10 years or more.

Comp time is accumulated when someone works more hours than they are scheduled, due to enforcement needs. Payment is to come out of Prop 1 reserve funding, not general revenue.

Employees will have the option of banking up to 80 hours rather than cashing out their totals. Banked totals range from zero to 468 hours among all department employees, for a total of 6,506 hours, averaging 97 hours per employee.

Sheriff John Jordan calculated in his proposal that, even if the buyout was spread over only five years, the cost would be less than hiring another individual to offset all the comp time for the entire staff. Payments will be distributed for participating employees with November payroll.

salderman@semissourian.com

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