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Michigan County Debuts Text-to-911 System

Oakland County, Michigan, residents will soon be able to text 911 to get emergency help.

By Robert Allen

 

For some emergencies, calling 911 isn't the most feasible option.

You could risk tipping off your location to a home burglar. You could be stuck in backcountry, where the cell phone signal is so weak that a call won't connect. Or perhaps, you can't hear.

In these and other cases, texting can be a lifesaver. In Oakland County, it's about to become an option.

"We want to have the latest and best technology that will allow us to help people when they call 911, or text 911, or make any contact to get help," Oakland County Sheriff Michael Bouchard said.

In the first three months of 2014, there were 21,683 attempts to text to 911 across the U.S., with 272 of them in Michigan, according to TeleCommunication Systems, the company working with Oakland County and wireless service providers to enable text-to-911.

But the usual response was a bounce-back message: "Make a voice call to 911 for help; text to 911 is not available."

Through most of Michigan and the U.S., calling 911 is the only reliable way to get emergency help from police, fire or emergency medical services, despite the widespread use of cell phones that text and send photos and video. But dispatch centers are catching up, as Oakland County plans to begin receiving text messages by the end of January.

It's only for Short Message Service; no iMessages or SnapChats. And they're asking people to use it only in a pinch.

"Call when you can; text when you can't," said Mel Maier, chief of emergency management operations for the Sheriff's Office. He said to expect an announcement soon when the service becomes available.

The text-to-911 service works much like any text-message conversation, with the operator using a web browser to respond within seconds.

Officials emphasize that it's much more efficient to have a phone conversation if possible. But even a text of "Help," and nothing else, will generate a response to the location triangulated using cell towers -- as is done now with phone conversations, Maier said.

Because of cooperation with service providers such as Verizon Wireless and technology already in place, text-to-911 won't be any more expensive to operate than the existing service.

"There's no extra cost right now for the county to incur on this," Maier said.

Lapeer and Lake counties were the first to start offering the service, and officials with both say they've been pleased with the service and received a few texts per month.

The Oakland County dispatch center provides services for a number of communities, townships and entities separately from cities within it, such as Royal Oak.

But to ensure text-to-911 works everywhere inside the county lines, it's providing service for every Oakland County dispatch center. Officials said the service is to be especially helpful for people who are deaf or hard of hearing, as previous technology such as Text Telephone (TTY) and relay services become less popular.

Anytime someone texts 911 in the county, there should be a response, Maier said. And his staff has taken trips across the county sending hundreds of test texts to be sure.

Oakland County is the second-busiest dispatch center in the state, next to Detroit, he said. Detroit police Sgt. Michael Woody said the department has looked into text-to-911 but has such a high call volume that more innovation would be needed.

"It would be hard for us to vet out which ones are true 911 calls," he said, adding that it would be "worth revisiting if the technology improved."

The Detroit Police Department recently released an app that allows people to send tips and offers contacts for people to connect with local precincts. Woody said it's been downloaded about 10,000 times, and the department is moving toward next-generation 911.

The text-to-911 service is a temporary fix as dispatch centers go digital, opening floodgates for data such as live video and all manner of readings of vehicles, human vital signs and more.

In 10 years, you might be doing Skype or FaceTime with your 911 operator. "What could be better at an accident scene?" said Victor Martin, director of Lapeer County Central Dispatch. "Somebody could take their phone and panorama it? That would help us immensely."

His county (population roughly 90,000) was the first in Michigan to offer text-to-911, starting in October. And they've been preparing their system for the next generation.

Consumer technology has rapidly outpaced what's available to the nation's roughly 6,000 emergency dispatch centers; the first iPhone was released in 2007, and texting started gaining traction before that.

Last year, 84% of the 911 calls to the Oakland County Sheriff's Office came through cell phones, Maier said. An increasing number of phones offer video and image transfers.

The shift to the next generation has taken time because the dispatch centers are run by local governments based on standards from pre-cellular days. And innovation will take money, security and interoperability among local sites.

"The technology we're doing right now in 911 is the same technology from 1964," Maier said. "That's what the biggest hurdle has been."

Harriet Miller-Brown, the 911 state administrator for Michigan, said she's optimistic the next generation will be available in five to 10 years.

"There's a lot of moving pieces," she said.

A number of locations are preparing, and the benefits should be immense.

Dispatch centers with peaking call volumes -- amid natural disasters or other large-scale emergencies -- or trying to help callers speaking rare foreign languages, will be able to move calls to other dispatch centers in a flash.

Sensors recording crash data will be able to send that along with images and other information directly to the dispatch center, she said. Maier said the Sheriff's Office is already trying to prepare staff for what's to be a "huge change" in dispatch, thinking about such changes as whether to put dispatchers face-to-face with people using video-streaming apps for help.

"Until it comes out, you're only guessing how it's going to be used by the public," he said.

(c)2015 the Detroit Free Press

 

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