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The Big Question
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Q: Why has the present basic 911 system fallen behind?
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A: With the huge increase in population and scattered development over the past few years, dispatchers and responders don’t know the location of new roads, new subdivisions, and new residences. New dispatchers and new responders don’t know older locations either. Many longtime residents describe their locations by landmarks that are familiar to themselves, but not to newcomers. Young children, visitors, older adults, injured victims, and frightened family members often can’t give a correct address. The present 911 system can’t overcome these many shortcomings.
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Q: What is wrong with the present 911 service?
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A: The present system depends completely on the caller to tell the dispatcher where they are, who they are, and what the phone number is. Most callers can’t answer all these questions for a variety of reasons, not the least of which is a normal panic mode that takes over in emergency situations. Precious time is lost while the dispatcher tries to gather the location information so the correct responding unit can be sent. Further time is wasted in determining the correct agency to notify. The chances for error multiply during this process. Timely and efficient emergency dispatch can make a huge difference in life and property-saving situations. Even a few minutes delay can be too much for a heart attack patient, a choking baby, an assault victim when an intruder grabs the phone away and hangs it up, or a structure fire. While the dispatcher is using precious time gathering location and phone information, the present call can not be dispatched and other emergency calls are going unanswered.
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What Should I do Right Now
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Q: What can I do until E-911 is in operation?
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A: Place an information card next to your phone with the phone number, name of the person billed for the phone, your physical address, and clear directions on how to get to your address from the nearest major street intersection. This will help your guests, children, and panicked adults to provide information when asked. Be sure you have your address number visibly displayed on your house or business so emergency vehicles can find you.
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Technology Questions
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Q: What is Enhanced 911 (E-911)?
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A: E-911 is an emergency communication system that shows the caller’s name, phone number, and physical address the moment the call is made. The E-911 system overrides blocked phone numbers. The information appears on a computer screen in front of the dispatcher, along with a map showing the physical location of the call and the correct fire, law enforcement, or ambulance agency for the specific address. Blaine County has two ambulance responders, five law enforcement responders, and seven fire responders. Selecting and sending the correct agency is vital. Time is critical in emergency response. E-911 saves time and assures accuracy. Sending the correct agency to the correct location, faster, is the essence of emergency response. You will continue to dial 911, just as you do now, after the enhanced system is activated, but the correct location information for the dispatcher and the correct agency to dispatch will be available the moment the call is placed.
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Q: Who benefits from E-911?
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A: Everyone benefits from the security and simplicity of being able to make an enhanced 911 call. Children, older parents and relatives, ill or injured friends, all the people we care about in our lives will be more likely to survive and lead healthier lives if emergency responders can find them faster and help them more efficiently.
We know that E-911 calls are rare for any given address, but eventually everyone has an emergency or knows someone who will have an emergency. When emergency response is needed, we want it to be fast, accurate, and efficient.
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Q: What other benefits will E-911 have for the public?
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A: It will give the E-911 dispatcher more time to give emergency medical advice to the
caller (CPR for babies, tourniquets for excessive bleeding, clearing blocked breathing passages, poison antidotes, etc.) while the caller is waiting for the responding emergency vehicle to arrive. It will also provide communication for the deaf or hard-of-hearing. It will provide location information, even if the call is cut-off before the caller can complete the emergency call. It will take some of the stress out of the dispatcher’s job, enabling the dispatcher to stay focused and helpful, and making retention of experienced dispatch personnel more likely.
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Q: Why not just use Caller ID?
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A: Unfortunately a large number of phones block their numbers so Caller ID can’t show
them. Some calls are made on dedicated phone lines (fax or computer) that can’t be called back. Even for those that are unblocked, they don’t always show a name, so the dispatcher still has to try and cross-reference the number with a physical address from a phone book or try to have the phone company trace the call. The phone book address may not be correct or the caller may have moved since the phone book was printed or the address may be unfamiliar to the dispatcher. All this cross-checking takes precious time and is subject to error. Finally, Caller ID costs each user $7.00 per month. For those who don’t already have Caller ID, it is 7 times more expensive than the one dollar per month E-911 cost.
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Q: Will E-911 violate my privacy?
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A: No. Your phone and location information is only displayed to the dispatcher when you
make an emergency 911 call. However, the phone company already knows your phone number (even for unlisted numbers) and your physical and billing address.
The Assessor’s Office already knows your physical address, as do the electric, gas, and cable companies. There is no privacy for this information: it is all of public record already. There is nothing to fear on privacy issues from E-911.
Some folks have also expressed concern that the GPS chip technology will enable the government to invade their privacy and monitor their calls even though the GPS location technology is for E-911 only. This is already a possibility. Based on news reports of cell phone monitoring of calls in Afghanistan and around the world, most of the intelligence agencies in all countries already monitor cell calls, even without the GPS chip. In any event, E-911 is a life-saving technology not a tool to invade privacy and the issue of GPS chips is Federal law over which we have no control. GPS chips will be in cell phones whether Blaine County has E-911 or not.
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Q: What about cell phone calls from the backcountry or on a road somewhere?
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A: Unfortunately, current cell phone technology does not allow for precise location information. However, the Federal Communications Commission requires new cell phones to have GPS technology that will show their location within 300 meters.
Our proposed E-911 hardware and software will be compatible with this technology. Cell phones will be charged a line fee as many of our 911 calls come from cell phones. Cell phone users will want E-911 to be in place so their location will be available when they make a future E-911 call. We will provide this opportunity as soon the technology becomes available. We expect cell phone users to be avid supporters of E-911.
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Q: What is the status of cell phone technology?
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A: We have received word that cellular phone companies are beginning to install the required GPS-compatible hardware on their cell towers. (The additional antennas only require about 4 inches of space on the tower.) This process should be completed by December 2005. Makers of cell phones have begun installing the required GPS chip in each new phone. The cell phone companies will begin offering marketing incentives at the end of the year to encourage cell phone owners to exchange their old phones for the new GPS phones. This location technology for cell phones can only be interpreted by E-911 systems, so there is no need to worry that a cell phone call location can be identified by any individual who answers a non-E-911 call. By the time our E-911 system is in place, we anticipate that the majority of cell phones will be compatible with our E-911 system.
However, the cost of including wireless technology in the E-911 system is more expensive than the cost of land line connections. It may take a longer period of time to get cell phone location information on our computer screens, but we'll still be able to receive cell phone calls.
The main difficulty with cell phone connections now is the lack of cellular towers in our community. When you lose a call or can't make a call now, it is usually because there is inadequate coverage. Until, more cellular towers are permitted in the County, these problems will continue and will also prevent E-911 calls from getting through to the Dispatch Center.
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Timing Questions
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Q: When will E-911 be operational?
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A: It takes Qwest about 12-18 months to complete their network phone system integration with the County’s physical address system. This process is underway and we are making excellent progress. We are hoping to have E-911 no later than December of 2004. The fee collected between January 2003 and the start of E-911 will be used to pay for the hardware and software that makes E-911 possible.
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Q: Can the County Commissioners raise the phone fee charge in the future?
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A: No. Under the Emergency Communications Act, the State of Idaho is the only governing body who can change rates upward. It would require the Legislature to change it. The present maximum one-dollar fee has proved more than adequate to fund the system for all other Idaho Counties.
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Q: Will I have to make any changes to my present phone in order to get this service?
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A: No. All the needed phone system changes will be handled by Qwest and are part of the system costs associated with E-911.
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Q: Will the E-911 system also cover phone customers of the other phone companies in Blaine County?
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A: Yes. Qwest will coordinate with all the other companies so their customers can also
receive this vital service. At present those other companies are Midvale, Citizen's, CenturyTel, and McLeodUSA.
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Q: Will the phone fee cover all the future costs of providing enhanced emergency dispatch?
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A: The good news is that the County already funds the present emergency dispatch system out of its current budget, so all it needs to get to, and maintain, E-911 is the phone fee and some funding help from the cities and rural fire departments.
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Q: My business is only open weekdays from 9AM to 5PM. Can I get a reduced line charge for
my business or for a part-time residence, which is only occupied a few weeks a year?
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A: E-911 only works if every phone line in the County is part of the emergency phone system. It is an integrated system and the phone company is required to ensure its reliability and accuracy. There can't be any exceptions or the system won't function effectively. Every new phone line will be automatically programmed into the E-911 system before it is activated at a home or business. Even if you have several phone lines in the same general area, they still must all be on the system because an E-911 call may come from any one of the phone lines; people won’t be looking for the only phone that is connected to the E-911 system when an emergency occurs.
An emergency can take place anywhere and at anytime. The person making the emergency call may not even work at the business location nor be a resident or guest of a second home, but they may happen to be there when the emergency occurs. The caller may not speak English and may not be able to describe their location.
The issue isn't how often a call might come from a particular location (just during business hours? or just when the part-time residence is in use?), but whether a call might come at all. If a call comes in, we need to know where it comes from, period.
The system is operated and maintained 365 day a year, 24 hours a day.
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Questions About Cost
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Q: How much is this going to cost me personally?
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A: Up to a dollar per month, per phone line, on your phone bill and for your cell phone. It is important to remember that you don’t pay for how many actual phone extensions or connections you may have scattered around the house or in your offices; the line fee only applies to the number of lines (not phone units) you pay for on your telephone bill.
The County Commissioners set the actual fee and they can lower it in the future, if the full amount isn’t needed. The phone fee goes into a dedicated E-911 fund and can only be used for E-911 costs, not for any other county departments. Since the initial cost of the new system is high, it is likely that the actual charge will be a dollar per line so the system’s initial costs can be funded. At some point in the future, the dollar charge can be reduced.
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Q: Do all the other E-911 Idaho counties have a phone fee?
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A: Yes, all of them. Several counties are now at 75 cents rather than a dollar and two are at 50 cents, now that their initial systems are already in place. When our system is fully upgraded, we’ll look at lowering the monthly phone fee.
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Q: It looks like I’ll have to pay for E-911 every month for the foreseeable future. How often will I need to use E-911?
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A: Let’s hope you never need E-911, but if you do need it, you’ll want it to work fast and effectively. It is a form of life and property insurance that all of us will pay now and hope we won’t need to collect on later. E-911 isn’t just for our families and ourselves, it is also for our friends, neighbors, and business customers.
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Q: Is this phone line fee just for local residents?
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A: Everyone with a non-exempt phone line, including businesses, shares in the cost. Part-time residents, rental units, and tourist accommodations are included as well. Dispatchers need to know where every call is coming from, to send emergency units, and emergency calls are just as likely to come from businesses and visitors as from local residents.
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Q: Why doesn’t the County pay for E-911 out of its regular budget?
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A: The County pays for the current system and its personnel already, but the cost of
the phone company network system and its subsequent monthly charge, as well as the initial hardware and software needed to make E-911 work, is expensive. The initial cost is $450,000. The refinements to the system and real-time computer screens for the responding vehicles are another $500,000. This can be funded out of the future one- dollar line fee collections. The subsequent yearly Qwest cost to maintain the E-911 system is about $50,000 annually. Although total property taxes in Blaine County seem high, less than 20 percent of your property tax bill actually goes to the County. There is no surplus in the County budget to cover the additional costs of E-911. If we want it, we have to pay for it with a telephone line fee.
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Q: Who paid for the public education campaign prior to the election?
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A: The Heinz Foundation and the EMS Association paid for the information ads and materials to educate the public. No taxpayer funds were used.
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Other Idaho Problems
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Q: Qwest has been in the news lately. Will Qwest be able to service Blaine County with all we are hearing about their financial troubles?
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A: Yes. Like a lot of current businesses, which have attempted to show profits as higher than they really are, Qwest has engaged in some questionable accounting practices. However, their cash flow and system operations are healthy. At the local level they don’t anticipate any interruption to their phone operations.
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Q: What have I been reading about dispatch problems in Twin Falls and Boise?
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A: There has been a lot on negative publicity about the Consolidated Dispatch systems in
Twin Falls and Boise, but the problems are not related to E-911. Political and turf battles are keeping the Twin Falls and Boise emergency agencies vying to determine who gets to control the Consolidated Dispatch system and its budget.
Recent newspaper and television coverage of the problems in Ada County (Boise) are raising unnecessary concern in Blaine County. 99.99 percent of E-911 systems in the US are working perfectly. Blaine County will use a proven technology that works nation-wide. Blaine County won’t be trying to break new ground.
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Q: What problems did Boise have?
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A: Ada County attempted an untried, untested, very sophisticated software package and technology that was designed to do far more than just provide E-911. They are having problems with the peripheral components of the system and the bells and whistles, as well as their management systems. However, the E-911 component of the system functions adequately. In the sensationalist media stories, this fact is not high-lighted.
Blaine County will not emulate Boise.
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EMS Assocation
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Q: Who or what is the Wood River/Sawtooth Region EMS Association?
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A: It is an Association of all the law enforcement, fire, ambulance, and related responding emergency agencies in Blaine and Camas Counties, and their Cities, and the Stanley area of Custer County.
It was organized in 1997 through a generous grant from the Heinz Foundation. It meets monthly to coordinate emergency-related activities, and it develops plans for the emergency response future of our community. Its most recent achievements have been the provision of paramedic-level ambulance service to Blaine County’s residents and visitors and Enhanced 911 as the next step in providing faster, accurate emergency response.
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