About 2,200 addresses in Chatham County aren’t showing up correctly on new computer software used in emergency vehicles, one of several glitches that make it difficult for emergency responders to quickly help people in need.
County officials were aware of the problem for nearly six weeks. They say they are working to fix problems holding back $6 million worth of software installed last fall in an effort to cut emergency room wait times and save lives.
Still, paramedics are turning to Google Maps to get to the right locations after outages hampered emergency responses to car wrecks and medical situations in areas like Southbridge, according to Chatham Emergency Services CEO Chuck Kearns. In January, the head of EMS warned the county commissioners about the software problem.
In the statement for Current County Administrator Michael Kaigler confirmed Friday the number of addresses not connected to the 911 software, but said concerns about the software are “minimal.”
He said county staff are fixing data discrepancies by manually plugging missing addresses into the computer-aided dispatch (CAD) system.
“The new CAD system demonstrated excellent performance with minimal issues,” Kaigler said in a statement. “However, concerns raised by the partner agency suggest that approximately 2,260 addresses are not recorded in the system.” The statement clarifies that the addresses are in the software but are not properly linked to the mapping.
District 6 Commissioner Aaron Whitely said the digitization of CAD/RMS should make processes more efficient, not less.
“With over 2,000 locations that haven’t even been mapped, that’s unacceptable,” Whitely said. He said he plans to talk to the county mayor about the issue.
‘Mapping is turned off’
On October 10, 2023, Chatham County transitioned its CAD and Records Management Services (RMS) — used by all of the county’s emergency and law enforcement agencies, except Tybee Island — to a system operated by Florida-based CentralSquare Technologies. The change was intended to modernize the county’s aging emergency systems and address Chatham County’s expected population growth.
Public statements from emergency officials and county documents obtained by Current suggest that the system had problems early on.
Computers inside ambulances meant to display CAD information about 911 calls repeatedly crashed, program manager Kelvin Lewis told the county manager in a Dec. 21 memo. This left drivers without basic information about their destination, including medical information provided by the caller and street intersections to help identify the location.
The memo also stated that the CAD system was unable to generate basic statistics such as response time.
“Program performance was affected by an undefined ‘gremlin’, which we are working with the vendor to resolve as soon as possible,” Lewis wrote.
The memo also said the CentralSquare contract cost the district $2.4 million at that stage of the contract, with $3.6 million left to pay.
On Jan. 17, Kearns told county commissioners that emergency services were repeatedly sent to the wrong location on the dispatch software.
“Mapping is off. So, in (one) case, we were going to a traffic accident on I-16 near I-95. The mapping was telling our crews to go to Southbridge for a crash on the interstate,” he said.
The software is supposed to connect the ambulance to the nearest street where the emergency call came from, but it mistakenly sent the ambulance to routes that are not available. This has forced emergency operators to find other solutions, such as free, commercially available mapping services.
“While Chatham County staff are actively working to link these addresses to the routing tool, in the meantime, first responders are using alternative mapping tools such as Google Maps to determine the most efficient route,” Kaigler said in a statement.
911 in crisis
The challenges of implementing the new county dispatch service overlap with the complex issues at Chatham’s EMS center.
The center’s dispatchers enter key information about emergency calls, such as location and details of the emergency, into the CAD system for use by first responders on their mobile computers. But reports suggest the information may not make it to CAD.
County commissioners said the volume of complaints they receive about unanswered 911 calls has increased dramatically.
From 2022 to 2023, there was a 37% increase in the number of abandoned emergency calls, where the caller hangs up or the call goes unanswered, according to Savannah Morning News.
Chatham 911 communications director Diane Pinckney told the newspaper that the increase is due to better tracking of statistics, understaffing, high call volumes exacerbating shortages and more people calling 911 at the same time.
She and other emergency officials also blamed callers for using 911 during non-emergency situations.
The center employs “call takers,” whose sole job is to answer the phone, question callers for basic information and route calls to available dispatchers, according to Deputy Director Russ Palmer. Dispatchers then coordinate available fire/police units or direct the call to Chatham 911 for emergency assistance.
At the commissioners’ meeting in January, District 1 Commissioner Helen Stone asked what the optimal number of callers per shift was.
“If we were fully staffed, we’d have four call takers every shift,” Pinckney said. Dispatchers can answer calls when recipients are busy.
However, the four people who take calls can quickly become overwhelmed during a flurry of calls, Palmer said at the meeting. During a recent surge, they had 150 calls in a 30-minute period, he said. Dispatchers must spend their time talking to 911 callers instead of directing emergency vehicles.
That number seemed to confuse the county commissioners. “Four people for a district of 300,000 … that doesn’t sound right to me, and I’m not even in the business,” Stone said.
Later in the presentation, Pinckney acknowledged that four people probably isn’t enough to handle the district’s needs.
“It’s exciting to me that you’re all aware of it now,” Pinckney said.