The capital city’s 911 call center is by far the busiest one in the state, taking over 600,000 calls in 2022. But the city has struggled to fully staff the center in recent years.
Joseph Wade, interim police chief of the Jackson Police Department, says the level of requests for service the call center receives is unique in Mississippi.
"We average 7,000 to 10,000 calls for service a week. ...That is not comparable to any local law enforcement agency in the state of Mississippi," Wade said. "That's comparable to Birmingham, Memphis, New Orleans. So we have to be honest about that."
Though the city has budgeted for 48 full-time dispatchers, they only have 29. To make up the difference, the city has used a temp agency to hire 14 temporary dispatchers and four police recruits have been assigned to the call center.
Another issue JPD is facing is dispatcher burnout. Shequita Townsend has been with JPD for 18 years and currently works in the call center. She says that learning how to deal with the stress of the job takes a while.
"It took me a long time to separate the emotional part about it," Townsend said. You just try not to take it home or you try not to bring home to work. It's something you just have to practice every day until it becomes second nature. It's second nature to me now."
To address burnout, the call center recently switched from 12-hour shifts to 8-hour shifts. Wade says this change has already improved employee performance and morale.
"We have seen results in the month of July," Wade said. " As far as their performance, there has been a drastic improvement... We were impacting their quality of life as dispatchers by having them over there 12 hours straight."
Wade said he plans to work with the Jackson City Council to tackle the dispatcher staffing issue.
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