Communications Spotlight:
West-Comm

Josh Goldmark

by Josh Goldmark

June, 2011

After a few questions from fellow dispatchers about the make-up of my organization, I decided to write a quick overview about us.

I work for West-Comm, which is the shortened version of “West Cities Police Communications”.  We were formed in 1997 by a joint powers agreement between the Cities of Seal Beach, Los Alamitos, & Cypress.  Our center is physically located in the Seal Beach Police facility and went through a facelift in 2007 which included new console furniture/workstations, sound absorbing wall material, carpet, and an extensive upgrade in technology.

Since we were first formed, we have also taken on the contract dispatch services for the Orange County Harbors, Beaches, and Parks Rangers.  They patrol 20 urban and wilderness parks as well as 7 miles of beaches and coastland along with 27,000 acres of open space.

The three city police agencies are all currently operating on one primary radio frequency in the 800 mhz CCCS, or “Orange County Countywide Coordinated Communications System.” This is a recent change from many years past where we had the smaller Cities of Seal Beach and Los Alamitos on one primary, and the City of Cypress on their own primary.  This is appears to be the result of an ongoing effort by the PD management and administrators to consolidate certain services of the 3 contiguous cities.  The Park Rangers operate on a separate radio frequency.

Staffing of the center never goes below 3, which includes a Lead dispatcher or COIC, a communications operator in charge, qualified to fill in for the Lead.  During most day shifts and peak activity hours, staffing is 4 personnel.  There is one dispatcher for primary radio channel, another dispatcher handles the park ranger channel and phones, and the remaining dispatchers handle just phone calls and requests from the primary radio dispatcher.  Our personnel work 12 hour shifts and usually have either Monday-Wednesday or Thursday-Saturday with all payback days worked on Sundays.

In 2010, West-Comm handled a total of 29,057 calls on 911.  Our dispatchers also dealt with 94,505 total combined calls for service & officer initiated incidents.  This doesn’t include the over 8,000 events related to the OC Park Rangers. 

Equipment in the center includes the PEI Vesta Pallas phone system, West Covina Service Group CAD system, and Motorola Centracom Elite dispatch radio console.  The CAD system supports MDT’s as well as GPS based AVL system that we monitor on a separate screen that displays all police patrol units.

A ‘user group’ was established many years ago to facilitate streamlined operations for the 3 cities.  The group is made up of supervisors and managers from the 3 police agencies as well as West-Comm.  The group discusses topics ranging from the running of wants & warrants to the use of common terminology.  Each of the representatives solicits input for discussion topics from their respective employees prior to each meeting.

Although we at West-Comm don’t have quite as much face-to-face interaction with the officers as other centers may, we still maintain a great working relationship with all.  We are included in many activities that allow us to see the officers, both on duty and off duty.  This has helped us maintain a good working environment and successful operation for 14 years.

 

 

To learn more about West-Comm, visit their website.