By Susie Neilson : sfchronicle – excerpt
Valerie Tucker has a tough job even in ideal conditions. As a 911 dispatcher in San Francisco, she handles a barrage of high-stakes and often traumatic situations every day, coordinating the city’s response to emergency calls.
But right now, conditions are far from ideal. Tucker and her fellow dispatchers are working longer hours and getting fewer breaks. Many are on the verge of burnout, she said. And increasingly, they’re unable to keep up with the constant stream of calls that indicate their city is waking up to a turbulent, post-pandemic status quo.
“It’s dire straits for sure around here, and it’s not getting any better,” Tucker said. “Most of us in the room are starting to (ask), is this worth it?”
According to the Department of Emergency Management, San Francisco’s 911 call dispatchers answered just 72% of calls within 15 seconds in October, the latest month available. That’s the lowest share of any month in the last six years, and well short of the department’s goal to answer 95% of calls in 15 seconds or fewer…
The growing crush of emergency calls hitting a shrinking staff means department leaders must force the dwindling workers to work “mando,” or mandatory overtime, for months at a time, increasing their risk of burnout…
And with San Francisco’s hiring process taking an average of 255 days last year, new staff are not coming in quickly enough to replace retiring or burned-out workers — especially because it takes a year to fully train a dispatcher… (more)
It sounds like they need a new approach to managing the system. Shorterless demanding hours and more part time workers woud make the job more appealing, especially if it could be done outside the office. But, this is up to the geniuses at City Hall to figure out, or not.