Dispatch Drama

[InSane1]

This post was in response originally to Dispatchers... Why?

Realized it was restricted.. sorry guys.. but I HADDA TELL IT!

I hear you on the dispatchers thang. I'm Police clerk and so rather than switching to county chanel to do dl & warrant checks, I do them for our officers.

Our county dispatchers are notorious for being "Badge collectors", if you know what I mean. Fortunately they are awesome and professional on the radio, but every once in a while they tend to get a lil ****y. As do the officers.

I remember that one particular dispatcher, got all bitchy at me when my Sergeant told me to call the county and get an RP's phone number and call him. He gave me no other instructions, and I know this guy well. If I had asked, why? He would have been like.. JUST DO WHAT I SAID AND DONT ASK QUESTIONS! I call up dispatch and this chick that drools at the sight of him, (and who I went to the academy with and is particularly jealous that she dont have my job) answers up and I ask for the RP's phone #. She starts questioning me and yelling at me because I don't know why he wants me to call and not them. I was like, " I have no idea, whats the number, whats the number please. He is waiting"

Well she finally gave it up and later on after the call she sends him an MDT message asking about why he had me call, and he was told her that he was on foot and wanted to be able to relay messages to the RP and vise versa and didn't want to take up air space, that it was none of her damn business and she should think again before questioning his authority. He asked me about it later and wanted to know what she said to me. needless to say, she expressed her appologies..lol

Off the air its all drama. lol.

[jellybean40]

Liked the post. lol.

It's hard for me to read all the bad stuff said about dispatchers tho, especially if the person saying it has never done the job. i dont know how many have and how many havent.

I respect LEO's and think they're job is hard and stressful, but i also know some really hard-working dispatchers that do a great job; yes some nites they can watch tv on and off, and then some nites they are slammed with everything going on at once. they have complaints about how alot of officers treat them, and alot of things officers do that seem to make their job harder also; i will say it goes both ways.

i know there have been threads on this before, and i know there are some lazy dispatchers, and some lazy officers. i think the bottom line is teamwork. when i hear the petty stuff that goes on, i think maybe they're not realizing the importance of their job, on both sides.

[capt. magneto]

stupidity goes both ways sometimes. there are lazy staff on both sides. now i have never been a dispatcher but i have sat in dispatch while they went to the potty... i have to tell ya i do respect the job they do. it's just like patrol. you have long spells of silence then all heck breaks loose. same for them. but they have to deal with the crazy people on the phone and can not just hang up or give them an ear full. just like us they have to take it and move on. however , they have to deal with the caller and still answer all the other lines that are coming in and for those callers they have to sound like they are concerned about their problems. i think that they do have it good at times, and i think it sucks at time....i absolutly respect a good dispatcher.

[Sig220Man]

It's hard for me to read all the bad stuff said about dispatchers tho, especially if the person saying it has never done the job.

Unfortunately the rift between sworn and non-sworn members of any department has been going on for as long as sworns and non-sworns have had to work together as a team.

This type of conflict makes for a LOOOONGGG shift for everybody involved. The dispatchers think the officers are being mean to them, so they cut them no slack and slam them with non-stop calls, deny them their Code 7's, etc.

The officers then think the dispatcher is picking on them so they do things like get snippy on the radio, or intentionally bombard them with radio traffic. And it goes on....believe me, I've been on BOTH sides of such wars. And it can get quite ugly.

Fortunately, my department is better than most when it comes to dispatcher/sworn relations. While the overwhelming majority of officers have respect for the dispatchers, there have been (and always will be) a few knuckleheads who believe in the phrase "If you're not sworn, you're not born."

Patrol and dispatch supervision has also done a pretty good job of maintaining the good relationship between the two. New dispatchers do a series of ridealongs with officers, and as part of their FTO phase new officers have to sit so many hours in dispatch. They are also quick (most of the time) to recognize any brewing "wars" between the two sides of the radio, and are (usually) very quick to put an end to it.

i know there have been threads on this before, and i know there are some lazy dispatchers, and some lazy officers. i think the bottom line is teamwork. when i hear the petty stuff that goes on, i think maybe they're not realizing the importance of their job, on both sides.

That's what I've been saying all along.

[ 03-24-2002: Message edited by: Sig220Man ]