Madison- Monday, First Selectman Tom Scarpati said management of the town's emergency dispatch operation would be taken out from under the Police Department.
“Beginning immediately, dispatch will report temporarily to John Bowers, director of emergency management,” he said.
The move is one of several steps Scarpati said he was prepared to take to resolve the concerns raised publicly over the last two weeks by the town's two volunteer fire companies and the Madison Ambulance Association. (Please see accompanying story on Page A - )
The first selectman said additional dispatchers would be hired to address concerns of understaffing, and he was hoping to hire a part-time employee to manage the dispatch operation. He said he has discussed the moves with Police Chief Paul Jakubson, who has agreed with the changes.
“This is not necessarily a resolution of the problem, but I hope it improves the situation while we investigate regionalization,” he said.
Two weeks ago, saying they were frustrated by the Board of Selectmen's lack of action, the chiefs of the two fire companies went public with their concerns over the operation of the town's dispatch center.
“It has turned into a bureaucratic tangle that no well-meaning organization could undo,” they told Scarpati in a letter, and pushed for the selectmen to approve regionalization of the emergency dispatch operations--fire and ambulance--with Guilford.
At a second meeting days later, the volunteer firefighters, representatives of the ambulance association, and administrators from the Police Department all aired their concerns and opinions in a public meeting with Scarpati and selectmen Charles Walz and Kathi Traugh. Although there was no resolution reached at that meeting, Scarpati took some actions on his own in the following days.
On Monday he said, “Effective immediately dispatchers will report to John Bowers, pending the hiring of a part-time individual to oversee the dispatch center. Additional dispatchers will be hired to properly cover every shift. We have looked at the budgets. The money is there. It appears there are sufficient per diem dispatchers to fill out shifts properly.”
At the same time, he said, the Police Department will make changes in its telephone system. The dispatch center will no longer be the main answering point for every non-emergency call to the station.
“This should fix some of the immediate issues while we investigate regionalization,” Scarpati added.
The volunteer fire companies have been advocating a move toward regionalization with Guilford for fire and medical emergency calls. Scarpati has said he would prefer to “fix the problem in-house.”
The first selectman said these steps “provide temporary answers to the three main issues,” which he described as moving management of the dispatch center to a neutral third party, hiring necessary additional dispatch personnel, and providing the selectmen with time to study regionalization.
“The firefighters say they have been waiting 18 months. They have. It is their right to be angry with me. I knew the problems and did little to help them. I hope they can wait two or three more months to see what more we can work out,” Scarpati explained.
At a meeting last week, members of the ambulance association suggested that Power Phone, a company located in Madison that has developed dispatch systems for the state of Vermont and the United Nations, be called in to study the problem. Scarpati said he had spoken to the president of the company and that “a proposal would be prepared down the road” but the company would not be involved immediately.
He maintained that the Board of Selectmen will “keep its promise to the fire companies” and vote on the regionalization proposal at its next meeting, Dec. 19.
© The Day Publishing Co., 2005
For home delivery, please call 1-866-846-9099