Avon Police Department Dispatchers Settled into Upgraded Center

When designing a police dispatch center there are many things to consider, but one of the most important is the fact a dispatcher may sit in one room for as long as 16 hours while working.

That is something the Avon Police Department took into consideration when drafting its plans for an upgraded dispatch center. The newly designed center opened on Feb. 28, completed within three weeks Feb. 7 project start date, a week earlier than expected.

“The biggest thing was to handle the ergonomic environment so that it was ergonomically best for our employees,” Avon Police Chief Mark Rinaldo said. “They’re stuck in that room for eight to 16 hours in some cases.”

Avon Police Captain Robert Whitty led the project planning, which was a collaboration between the police department, town and dispatchers.

“It was a pretty old system that needed to be redone and now everything is computerized. As technology improved, the cost went down,” said Rinaldo.

One of the conference rooms down the hall was wired for dispatching and used as a temporary dispatch center during the renovations. Whitty said that “the police department can’t be down for any amount of time” and the dispatchers did not miss a single call.

Last year alone the department received 25,000 calls, Whitty said.

Improvements

Before the renovation, the dispatch center had one curved desk piece where all dispatchers on a shift would work.

“What happens is that one person answers the phone and you get noise pollution,” Rinaldo said. “The new environment allows you to concentrate on just the caller.”

Now, there are three separate stations.

Jay McCaffrey, who was the first civilian to join the dispatch team in 1981 and who is now retired and filling in on occasion, said that the new dispatch center is a “vast improvement” over the old one. He noted that the new computer monitors are stacked in a modular style that allows them to be shifted to different heights and positions, also creating more space for the equipment.

“It is a lot more functional,” McCaffrey said. “There is the ability to stack the screens and move them where you need them ... Before we were lacking the space to put everything where we could.”

The dispatchers also no longer have to flip between programs, Rinaldo said, and the dispatchers have access to state databases, Computer Aid Dispatch, radio communication, a 911 call answering service that can also trace where a call was placed, and video surveillance of the building and cell blocks.

With the new design, even the small details make a big impact. The desk surfaces can be electronically elevated to suit a dispatcher’s height and can also be raised to standing height. Dispatcher Chris Corso said that is especially important for him because he is tall.

Plus, the chairs are more comfortable, Rinaldo said.

The changes, though, are not only for comfort and convenience. The ergonomics makes a difference in helping to prevent strain injuries from stress and being stationary too long.

“The new workstations are comfortable and, most important, ergonomically functional,” said Dale Swanson, a senior level dispatcher with the Avon Police Department, in an email. “The consoles were designed with ergonomics in mind. With repetitive strain injuries that were beginning to happen with the stationary consoles that we had, it is nice to be able to adjust our new work stations to fit the needs of all us dispatchers.”

Swanson said all of this helps the dispatchers to be more efficient, as the ergonomics of the furniture allow the dispatchers to be more mobile in limited space.

“Our new dispatch center is beautiful,” she said.

And there is another benefit.

“This new dispatch center has been a morale boost for us dispatchers,” said Swanson.

The new radio system is computerized and connects with police vehicles, fire department, ambulance, schools, statewide police hotline, and a shared radio frequency with Canton, Simsbury and West Hartford for direct communication.

The dispatchers can adjust the lighting in the room to be brighter or dimmer, which helps their eyes after they have been looking at computer monitors for a long time, Rinaldo said.

There is also a television in the room to give dispatchers something to do while waiting for calls.

“If you’re in there for eight hours and there aren’t calls, you have to change your mind and focus,” he said.

The air circulation has also improved, and now dispatchers have separate heating and air conditioning vents at their stations that they can control.

“We found some air ducts that weren’t connected for some reason, so now they’re reconnected,” Rinaldo said.

The background

Two years ago, the town allocated $563,000 in Avon’s capital improvement funds for upgrades in the police department. The new dispatch center cost about $250,000, Whitty said.

The current capital improvement plan includes at least five phases of police department projects that will cost about $100,000 less than originally requested, he said. The town could use any leftover money for other projects, pending approval from the Board of Finance, he explained.

“It’s a good thing to the town from a budget perspective ... We’ll be well under budget,” Rinaldo said.

The town had initially delayed the project because Avon received a $75,000 grant to do a regional dispatch study with the Canton and Simsbury police departments. Whitty is hoping that if that comes to pass, Avon would be equipped to be the centralized dispatch for the three departments.

Whitty said, however, that the money spent on the dispatch center would not be wasted if one of the other departments ends up housing regional dispatch because the technology and furniture in the new dispatch center is mobile and easy to disassemble quickly to move to another dispatch venue.

The town and the police department decided to approach upgrades to the department in phases.

The first priority was installing new automated locks on all the doors in the building in Dec. 2009, Whitty said, and then in 2010 the police department got a new video surveillance system that is now also at the Public Works Department offices and the Avon-Canton Canine Animal Shelter off of Arch Road.

In Oct. 2010, a wireless network for mobile reporting, access to state databases and criminal background checks was installed in all of the police department’s vehicles. Whitty said that the Avon Volunteer Fire Department will have use of that system as well, as the police department already does dispatching for the fire department.

The police department is also planning to create a secondary dispatch center that will double as the patrol officers’ room, which Whitty said should cost about $32,329.