{"id":1041396,"date":"2021-07-29T08:29:29","date_gmt":"2021-07-29T13:29:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/?p=1041396"},"modified":"2021-07-30T11:06:28","modified_gmt":"2021-07-30T16:06:28","slug":"smith-county-seeing-shortage-of-911-dispatchers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/?p=1041396","title":{"rendered":"Smith County seeing shortage of 911 dispatchers"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-thumbnail wp-image-1041415\" src=\"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/wp-content\/media\/2021\/07\/police-9-3-150x150.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" \/>SMITH COUNTY &#8212; The Smith County Sheriff\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Office is seeing a shortage of 911 dispatchers, but this issue is bigger than the local dispatch center, according to our news partner KETK. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153We\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re seeing a short decline nationwide of good qualified candidates putting in for these kind of positions,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Sergeant Larry Christian said. Christian said it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s been difficult trying find new employees. Most of the workers are in training and can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t help carry the work load. Christian hopes when they get up to date, they can help fill the gap. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153We\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re handling it and we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re going to be okay,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Christian said.<!--more--><\/p>\n<p>This isn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t only happening here in East Texas, it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s also a problem over in Austin. According to the information obtained through a Texas Public Information Act request, since 2019, more than 100 Austin Police Department 911 dispatchers, operators and supervisors resigned. Leaders at the sheriff\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s office say the lack of dispatchers impacts the entire community. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153So when we have a shortage of telecommunicators, it affects the deputies on the street, it affects the citizens, it affects basically the inner workings of the whole county,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Christian said. Sergeant Christian went on to say, most of the 911 dispatchers at the Smith County Sheriff\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Office are in training right now.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>SMITH COUNTY &#8212; The Smith County Sheriff\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Office is seeing a shortage of 911 dispatchers, but this issue is bigger than the local dispatch center, according to our news partner KETK. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153We\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re seeing a short decline nationwide of good qualified candidates putting in for these kind of positions,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Sergeant Larry Christian said. Christian said it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/?p=1041396\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Smith County seeing shortage of 911 dispatchers<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":61,"featured_media":1041418,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/wp-content\/media\/2021\/07\/police-9-3-150x150.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"Smith County seeing shortage of 911 dispatchers","footnotes":""},"categories":[177],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1041396","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-news-archive-archives"],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-11 00:10:08","action":"change-status","newStatus":"trash","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/wp-content\/media\/2021\/07\/police-9-3-150x150.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"Smith County seeing shortage of 911 dispatchers","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1041396","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/61"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1041396"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1041396\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1041417,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1041396\/revisions\/1041417"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1041418"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1041396"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1041396"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1041396"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}