In South Dakota's early days, public safety was a cop on a beat and a fit fire brigade able to haul pumps, hoses, and ladders quickly. Today, thanks to communication technologies, response times have been cut to minutes, sometimes seconds. A speedy response time is especially challenging in rural areas, where help is usually not readily available.
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The amount of time that passes between when an emergency dispatch office receives a call and when helps arrives at the scene often determines how well the situation turns out.
Kevin Karley, director of the Pennington County 911 Center says today's 911 system permits an unprecedented degree of real-time communication between dispatchers and officers in the field.
"When a 911 call comes into our center, anyone who's sitting at any location in the center can answer that call. We've got 15 positions here," Karley said. "We normally man anywhere from eight to 11 of those positions. So when the phone rings, anyone who's sitting here at any position in the center can answer that and start processing that 911 call. So within a matter of seconds, as soon as that call for service is created, they're able to actually voice dispatch that to the first responders, whether it be the police department, the sheriff's office, that a fire department, highway patrol, they're immediately able to get that information out, get it broadcast to the first responder. They can start moving in that direction. And it's really reduced our dispatch times and it's improved the amount of information that we're able to get to the first responders as they're responding."
Dispatch centers Pennington County's exist because communities are willing to pay for the very fast police and fire response they facilitate. People remember times when a slow response to a call for help might be only a little better than no response at all. In the towns of Dakota Territory, the smell of smoke and the sound of bells alerted fire brigades. Response time depended on how quickly they could haul their pumps, hoses and ladders to the fire. Brigade races gave bragging rights to the strongest, fastest crew.
In rural areas, response time for fires was a question of whether the neighbors saw the smoke and how quickly they could gather to form a bucket brigade. As for crime prevention in rural areas, a cool head and a shotgun by the door were the only options. Sheriff’s deputies and federal Marshalls were good at tracking down and arresting criminals but couldn't normally respond to a rural crime in progress.
In South Dakota’s growing towns and cities, a cop walking a beat was dealt with law breakers with whatever degree of force the situation required. From 1893 until 1926, cops kept the peace in downtown Rapid City with the help of night watchman John “Hooky Jack” Leary. Leary had been a miner but he lost that job, both of his hands and most of his hearing in a nearly fatal dynamite blast. As Rapid City’s night watchman, Hooky Jack walked the streets of Rapid City, making sure that doors and windows were locked. After more than 40 years on the job, Leary became the third Rapid City law enforcement officer to die in the line of duty when he was struck by a car.
Beginning in the late 19th century, telephones and motorized vehicles improved response times in emergency situations. Patrol cars changed the game on rural highways and byways. Mobility is especially important in Pennington County, South Dakota’s largest and one of its most diverse in terms of geography. Pennington county extends from the secluded Black Hills forests along the Wyoming border to the desolate Badlands in the east, with Rapid City in between. An emergency can mean anything from a stranded hiker or motorist to a forest or structure fire in a seriously remote location. Some of the County’s rural communities are located along state highways or improved county roads. Others, like Silver City, are more remote and take a considerable amount of time to reach. Volunteer fire departments in these communities are the norm.
The emergency phone call and dispatched response routine was the same for decades, but then, in 1968, the United States adopted a three-digit emergency number that would immediately connect callers with a local dispatch office. Rapid City adopted the service in December of 1973. Other phone exchanges in Pennington County were tied in over time. 911 was a major public safety upgrade, but in rural areas, there was still one problem.
"Well, speaking on rural highways, for example, if there was a crash," said Kevin Karley. "If a citizen motorist came across a crash, they would have to drive to the nearest location where there was a phone where they could dial 911 to get help, which of course delayed the response of first responders, delayed the response for any kind of medical attention, that kind of thing. And any kind of ongoing crime that people may witness, drunk drivers, reckless drivers, people stranded, those kind of things were all delayed because anyone had to go find a telephone in order to dial 911 to get help."
Cell phones solved that problem. GPS satellites and other digital-age technologies brought online in the last thirty years have solved others.
"It actually happens very frequently where lives are being saved and because of cell phone technology that didn't exist 20 years ago," Karley said. "Whether it's the ability to respond to an ongoing crime in the case of a domestic violence crime or something that may be mobile, it's not at a residence, it's occurring on a roadway or in a vehicle, things like those. Attempted child abductions where we have witnesses that can get information and dial 911 very quickly to get law enforcement officers to respond. There's just a lot of situations where cell phones have just been a game changer in law enforcement's ability to respond and apprehend people and save lives.”
Law enforcement officers normally communicate by two-way radio but they also routinely use cell phones for private conversations with one another.
"For example, there's a lot of scanners out there and there may be times when officers don't want to discuss specific information about an ongoing crime or a particular subject over the radio where it may be monitored on a scanner. And that time they can use their cell phones to relay that information."
Social Media Platforms like Facebook and Twitter are among the newer tools in public safety. Kevin Thom, Pennington County Sheriff, says the platforms are a way for officials to quickly and efficiently broadcast information about crimes and emergencies to the media and directly to the general public.
"So we pump out a lot of information, and then if we're seeking information," Thom said. It's a good way to ask the public to provide us information. Could be suspect of a crime, could be somebody who was in an area at the time of an incident that we want to interview. And we have had instances where we've got responses and be able to identify people, and help the case."
But criminals have access to advanced technologies too.
"Sure. They use technology for illegal purposes. So it will be gangs who could be dealing drugs, it could be coordinating a robbery, kidnapping, whatever. They use technology as well. I think there's more pluses than minuses when it comes to the use of technology in our world."