Habersham citizens have shared their frustrations and concerns with slow response times from the county’s emergency services online, and citizens brought those concerns forward at Tuesday night’s public safety town hall meeting.
At Habersham County Commissioner Bruce Palmer’s public safety town hall meeting, county public safety officials attended to answer questions and respond to concerns citizens had. One of the biggest concerns, and topics of discussion, was public safety response times.
Public Safety officials addressed those concerns, and nearly every official noted that their departments are facing understaffed crews.
“None of the city departments, or the county, has adequate personnel,” Emergency Services Director Chad Black said. “We rely heavily on a working relationship [with each other].”
Of the 11 county fire stations in Habersham, three are unstaffed. There are currently 19 24-hour employees in the Habersham County Fire and Emergency Services department, 2 10-hour Monday through Friday employees, and a total of 57 HCES personnel to serve the entirety of Habersham County.
“Response times aren’t just when the [fire] trucks start, or that patrol car,” Black says. “Response time starts when that citizen calls in and when they [E-911] answer that phone, that is when it starts.”
Habersham E-911 has to dispatch those calls, which Black says usually take two minutes or less, but after that dispatch call goes out, someone has to respond. If the only staffed fire engine available is on the other side of the county, it could take longer for those first responders to make it to the site of an emergency.
E-911 Director Lynn Smith says that right now, E-911 is operating with an average of three employees per shift, with five dispatching stations. And they’re not just dispatching calls for Habersham County, sometimes they get cellphone calls from other counties that need to be rerouted, or they need to dispatch for Georgia State Patrol.
“A lot of times we get asked the question ‘why is it taking so long?'” Smith said. “Typically, when somebody calls 911, we have two people pick up at one time. One person is asking questions . . . the second person is dispatching the call so there is no delay in service of any type, no matter what the call is. They’re going to keep you on the line just to get more information.”
E-911 isn’t just getting calls from around the region to dispatch, either. They’re getting non-emergency calls, which doesn’t just affect their efficiency, it affects other public safety departments.
“The problem that we run into a lot in our department is that people overutilize the 911 system,” Animal Care and Control Director Madi Nix says. “We get calls for stray animals to 911. . . 911 needs to be reserved for emergencies.”
Nix says those non-emergency calls and dispatches often cause animal control staff to work overtime after working 8-hour days.
With animal control emergencies, citizens are frustrated that emergency calls can take up to 25 minutes for an animal control officer to respond to the emergency. Nix says the officers are doing the best they can to get there as quickly as possible with the resources they have.
“We also don’t run codes, so people need to keep that in mind,” Nix says. “When they are calling us and they are upset that it’s taking us 20-25 minutes to get somewhere, these guys [animal control officers] are not considered to be response vehicles. And I know an aggressive dog is an emergency to most people, but that’s where we have to rely on our sheriff’s office and EMS to be able to get there before we can because these guys are not running lights.”
What’s the solution?
Palmer says public safety in Habersham is underfunded, causing many of the issues surrounding understaffing and slow response times.
According to Palmer’s presentation, to fully staff the county fire department, the current staff would need to double in size. It would cost about $2.69 million dollars to do that. Taxes pay for the salaries of those officers, and he says that bringing business and industry to the county could help offset those taxes. But other than that, he says a tax increase on county residents is the only other option.
“Where do we draw the line on not only employee safety but on the safety of our citizens?” Palmer asks. “What would it be worth if your loved one perished because somebody couldn’t get to them in time? There’s not a price tag for that.”
He encourages citizens with ideas on how to fund improving county public safety to reach out to him, Chad Black or Interim County Manager Alicia Vaughn.
“This is a real need, this is just one of the real needs that we have,” Palmer said.
