It’s been a week to recognize those taking emergency calls.

Every year during the second week of April, telecommunications personnel in the public safety community are honored for their work. Those who work in the Communications Center in Buchanan County were also recognized this week.  Sheriff Bill Puett said the operators are a vital part to emergency response.

“The telecommunicators do such a great job of calming folks and getting them the resources that they need,” Puett said. “Whether it’s medical services, or law enforcement services or fire services, they do it all.”

Genny Norton is a day-shift supervisor in the Communications Center.  She said in March they answered 4,600 911 calls.

“We are the primary 911 center for our county.  We take all emergency calls and non-emergency calls for police, fire and sheriff.  We assess what they need and get them going in the right direction,” Norton said.

24 operators and management personnel work in the communications center which is staffed around the clock, seven days a week. Norton said they deal with a wide variety of calls.

“It can range from having a missing child, to even the other day we had a man that was missing with dementia. It could be that a house is on fire or that somebody has fallen.  It could be that their car is broken into or their car was stolen.  They could be calling because they’re complaining because a car has been parked on the street too long,” Norton said. “It could be that they just don’t know who else to call and so they’ll call us.”

Norton said the recognition for comm center employees has been uplifting this week.

“It’s very heartwarming.  It makes you really feel appreciated.  A lot of times, you know we’re not seen by the public. A lot of times when people call us it’s on the worst day of their life,” Norton said. “It’s been nice this week that everything has been very uplifting.”

The 2017 National Public Safety Telecommunicators Week runs until Saturday.  For more information on the week, CLICK HERE.