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Rolette Co. to begin 911 service next week
Dec 30, 2008 (Grand Forks Herald - McClatchy-Tribune Information Services via COMTEX) --
Rolette County, N.D., will flip the switch on its new 911 system next week, making it the last county in the region to get the emergency phone service.
The north-central county bordering Canada has had a seven-digit emergency number for years, but come Jan. 7 residents will only have to dial the familiar three.
Starr Klemetsrud, communications director for the Lake Region Law Enforcement Center, said all 911 calls from Rolette County will be answered by her center in Devils Lake.
Rolette County Sheriff Tony Sims said his dispatchers will continue to field calls at (701) 477-5623 between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. Monday through Friday, but at all other times, calls to that number will bounce to Devils Lake. That's a plan, Sims said, he's hesitant to embrace.
"Anytime you split dispatch between two different houses, one house don't know what the other one did," he said.
Klemetsrud said she agrees it could take time to work out kinks in communication.
"I think it's going to be our dispatch center getting used to the way things are done up here, and them getting used to the way we do things," she said while she was in Rolette County for a meeting.
Both officials acknowledged the benefits of the 911 system: easier dialing for residents and faster responses from authorities thanks to computerized mapping and address recognition.
All counties in Minnesota, South Dakota and Montana have 911 service, according to officials in those states.
Almost 93 percent of the American population and about 96 percent of the geographic U.S. was covered by some type of 911 at the end of the 20th century, according to the National Emergency Number Association.
Long time coming
Rolette County voters gave the go ahead for a 911 system in 1994. Now, 14 years later, a launch is finally imminent.
"Which type of mapping system was going to be used, what type of address system was going to be used and who was going to do it -- it's just been a collage of different things that have held it up," Sims said.
He said overcoming jurisdictional issues when compiling address lists for the 911 system also proved a challenge in his county that's home to the Turtle Mountain Indian Reservation.
Under the new system, when calls go to Devils Lake dispatchers, they'll decide whether to alert county deputies or Bureau of Indian Affairs officers depending on a call's origin, Klemetsrud said.
In taking on Rolette County's emergency calls, she said, her center might need more dispatchers, but for now they're going to wait and see.
Rolette County has signed a yearlong contract with the center, Klemetsrud said. Benson, Eddy, Nelson, Ramsey and Towner counties already have similar agreements with the center.
After the county's contract expires, officials will reassess the situation, Sims said. The sheriff said he'd like to see the county eventually reclaim responsibility for all its emergency dispatching.
Cecily Fong, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Emergency Services, said Rolette County's 911 system is being locally funded.
For 911 service, phone customers generally pay a $1 monthly fee for each line and that money, collected by phone companies, is then distributed to local entities, Fong said.
Ingersoll reports on crime and courts. Reach him at (701) 780-1269; (800) 477-6572, ext. 269; or send e-mail to aingersoll@gfherald.com.
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