Public Safety vs Public Safety Radios

Just thinking outloud

I was thinking about the decline of volunteers in the fire service. I
was trying to figure out how to use "resident" firefighters in fire
stations (people who dont get paid but get free rent). I could not
come up with any good scenarios.

The primary issue with allocating resources for emergency public
safety agencies is the total random need for staffing. An agency can
go 20 to 30 years without ever needing more than 2 or 3 people to
handle an incident. Then, one day, they need 1,000 people to help them
- and fast.

CERT is one way to address this. Fire Explorers and auxiliary police
is another possible solution. But a better solution might be found
with advanced dispatching and radio equipment. We are starting to see
this with the PulsePoint app.

Try this scenario on for size. Every public safety worker is equipped
with a cellphone. Every one is tracked by the CAD system. On duty
staff is alerted to nearby calls. In the suburban and rural areas
there might not be any "on duty" staff. Everyone might be "off duty".
By "off duty" we mean - at home - at school - at the store - at the
movies - etc. But they are still fully trained and experienced. If a
call is received in a suburban or rural area, the CAD system knows who
the closest responders are. The CAD will send alerts to the closest
people (the minimum of people needed to handle the incident). The
closest people will respond - perhaps stopping along the way at a
public safety station to pick up an emergency vehicle.

There might need to be just a few hurdles to accomplish this very simple system.

1. Formation of a nation wide emergency responders service. (yup
combine all 50 states and all police & fire & EMS)

2. Development of a nationwide comms and dispatch system. We already
have the 911 part (and it is being updated as we speak). Everything
else is a mega shambles. LOL.

The primary advantage of this system will be that it will no longer be
necessary to wake up 50 people at 3 AM for a hemorhoid pain call. LOL
again. And the new system might save a few hundred thousand people
every year.