Knox County 911 Operations Director Laura Webster, right, and Bailey Reed, operations assistant, work with the new Computer-Aided Dispatch (CAD) system that went live this week; it includes a sophisticated GPS mapping system.
MOUNT VERNON — Knox County 911’s operations director, Laura Webster, gave a glowing assessment to Knox County Commissioners Thursday on how well the county’s new Computer-Aided Dispatch system has been running since it went live Tuesday.
The new Zuercher CAD system comes by way of CentralSquare Technologies. It has a lot of new features the old system, which had been in place about two decades, did not, she said. The Zuercher CAD system is already being used by the 911 program, the county sheriff’s office, county jail and the police departments of Mount Vernon and Fredericktown.
Webster also commended the county’s Information Technology Department, a team of four led by Kyle Webb, for its work on the project, which has included switching over to four new servers serving the 911 program as well as a new server at the sheriff’s office. Webb’s team has been in place less than a year as the county formerly contracted out for IT services. Zuercher CAD representatives were on hand Monday through Wednesday of this week to help with the transition.
“We really did not have any IT issues during ‘go live’ and things are running smooth,” Webster said. “Justin Smith (of the) Knox County Map Department also has been a tremendous help in creating the layers for our map. Anytime I requested a new layer or function for the map, Justin always produced it in a timely manner. The Zuercher trainer said it is one of the best maps she has seen.”
One of the prime advantages of Zuercher CAD over the old system is its ability to pinpoint where sheriff’s deputy and police vehicles are in proximity to a 911 call’s origin, Webster said — and can even estimate a time of arrival based on law enforcement proximity. Sheriff David Shaffer, who offered a report to commissioners later Thursday, said sheriff’s deputies are assigned to different areas within the county by geographic areas, such as the northeast or northwest. The priority of response to 911 calls will likely factor in now who is closest to the call by the estimated time of arrival, not just by who is assigned to an area. Typically, two deputies are assigned to the scene of a call, such as for domestic violence.
The new Zuercher CAD can, with a simple check-box system, add layers to a 911 GPS map, such as layers for township, corporation limit and fire district. It has a feature showing recent calls a 911 caller has had contact with. That can be very useful in a criminal investigation, Webster said.
Webster also commended Bailey Reed, 911 operations assistant, Nicole Crabtree, 911 supervisor, and Rick Lanuzza, Fredericktown EMS chief, for their work in going live with Zuercher CAD. Reed said additional technology 911 dispatchers are using, called Rapid SOS, can help pinpoint the elevation of a 911 caller within a structure such as a house — indicating what floor they would be on, and where.
County Administrator Jason Booth now that the new computer-aided dispatch system is up and running, for which the county paid about $430,000 for its portion, the next step would be to activate a countywide “Text 911” system. But first Zuercher CAD needs time to go operational and show its full value.
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