Sedgwick County officials held a news conference Wednesday to clarify a situation regarding a new computer-aided dispatch (CAD) system that is now being used to send police, fire and ambulance crews to emergency situations.
There have been recent media reports citing concerns from local firefighters union members who have said the system is not working properly. Sedgwick County Sheriff Jeff Easter, who chairs the county’s 911 Council, said some of the information that has been put out is erroneous. He said the CAD system went online in April, and there are some issues. He said some of them will be an easy fix, and others will take longer to correct. Easter chaired a special meeting Wednesday to get an update on the system, and he said he is happy with the outcome of the discussions.
Emergency Communications Director Elora Forshee said as expected with a big computer system, there were some glitches but not failures. She said there were some fire station alerting issues where a manual alert had to be sent out rather than using the automated process. She said there was nothing that prevented first responders from getting to emergencies, and the system is working now.
Forshee said she has been talking with Wichita, Sedgwick County and Derby fire officials and they have some ideas for the new system to enhance the response, and she said all of that can be built into the system, but that will take time. She said as technology evolves, there will be enhancements that can be made.
