Knox Regional Communications Center (KRCC), the county’s Rockland-based 911 dispatch service, found itself in a personnel crisis again last week. Staff by late Wednesday, Feb. 5, was reportedly down to just a handful, and Knox County Sheriff’s Office has now stepped in with deputies answering 911 calls for help.

Knox County Commissioners and staff are adamant that they are able to get the call center back on track, and that they will fill the ranks of six to 12 full-time employees soon.

Municipal fire and police chiefs, however, are not so sure. They met with Knox County Commissioner Marc Ratner the first week of February to signal diminished patience for the situation, and are exploring their own solutions.

A budget for creating a new dispatch center operated by the City of Rockland has been proposed. It calls for creating a seven-member dispatch operational center with an $804,549 budget.

But Knox County Commissioner Marc Ratner, of Camden, asked the municipal chiefs to slow their proposal on setting up a new dispatch. He intends that the county tries one more time to rebuild the public safety agency that has been in varying degrees of personnel turmoil for two years.

Ratner likens the task to doing maintenance on a car, and said the back-up system of relying on Waldo County's emergency call center is an option.

"If it isn’t able to be handled it can switch to Waldo, with no down time to public safety," said Ratner, Feb. 7. And, there is no cost to the taxpayer because KRCC has been understaffed, "there is plenty of money in call center to cover what we need to cover."

KRCC falls under the purview of county administration, and is funded by all property taxpayers in Knox County. KRCC has been in place since 2001, when municipalities opted into the centralized emergency dispatch. Prior to that, individual towns ran their own emergency dispatch systems.

KRCC, whose offices are on Park Street in Rockland, has been recruiting dispatchers since before 2015. (Since 2012, the KRCC has employed, for varying lengths of time, 40 staff members, according to Camden Town Manager Audra Caler). 

But in August 2023, problems had come to a head when the Knox Regional Communications Center Executive Board, consisting of fire, EMS and police chiefs, learned that the exodus of employees from KRCC had shrunk the corps of 13 dispatchers to just five.

In September 2023, Knox County Commissioners acknowledged in a letter to the public: "The immediate matter involving the Communications Center is, in our view, only a symptom of a more widespread problem. 

"While we do not pretend to know the full extent of the problem or its origin, it is our belief that it stems in large part from a lack of effective communication between County officials and County employees, as well as between County officials and the public at large.”

In public meetings, first responders had cited workplace toxicity at KRCC and a dispute over wages as the root cause for many of the 2023 departures.

As a result of that turmoil, KRCC pulled back from managing 911 calls and municipalities temporarily relied on Waldo County Communications Center to answer those calls for help. That meant Waldo County Communications Center received the 911 calls from people in Knox County and then routed the information down to the thin ranks of Knox RCC, where dispatchers processed the information and directed first responders to emergency scenes.

The process added another layer of communication, and an increased potential for mistakes to be made in that additional routing of information.

KRCC then concentrated on rebuilding its staff. In May 2024, the call center had rebounded enough to fill its roster and was once again sanctioned the State of Maine to field 911 calls at full capacity. 

This was a relief to regional first responders, for despite the professionalism and response of Waldo Communications Center staff, who they continue to thank publicly, the EMS, firefighters and law enforcement in Knox County rely on dispatchers who have local knowledge of the area, its side roads and sometimes arcane landmarks.

But the situation at KRCC apparently deteriorated again. Currently, there are staff who are on administrative leave, although Ratner declined to comment on the substance of the problem; instead, he referred those questions to current County Administrator Amber Christie, who is out of town until Feb. 17.

Knox County made a public statement Jan. 31, saying commissioners met Jan. 30 and support: "the County Administrator and the Knox Regional Communications Center Director in their implementation of necessary changes to continue to provide essential public safety services for Knox County. They plan to engage key members of the public safety community to develop a long-term action plan that will guide these changes with the citizens' safety and health as the number one goal."

Fire and police chiefs have agreed to wait for Christie's return before taking more action, although the Camden Select Board heard from Camden Police Chief Randy Gagne and Fire Chief Chris Farley about the situation at a regularly scheduled Feb. 4 meeting.

At that point, staffing levels at Knox RCC were at, "maybe four," said Camden Town Manager Caler.

She reported that Rockland had invited Camden and Rockport to look at the feasibility of setting up its own 911 call center, that could eventually include other Knox County towns.

There are a number of issues to weigh in creating a new center, she said, but indicated to the Select Board it was time to explore the possibility.

"It's like Ground Hog Day," said Camden Police Chief Randy Gagne. "We are back to where we were. Nothing has really changed. The personnel are down to critical staffing again.”

Like Ratner, he said the system could return to Waldo County Communications Center purview should KRCC not be able to function.

“There is a real possibility that could happen at any time,” he said. “We did meet last week. I'll take my hat off to Marc Ratner. He sat there and took all the questions we threw at him really well. It looks like there has been some momentum and probably more things have changed since Friday [Jan. 31].”

He cited management and staff problems, and suggested giving the county more time to resolve core issues.

"I think it is only fair to give them a couple weeks to see what they can come up with," said Gagne, noting, however, that the municipalities may need to take action if the situation does not improve.

He said Camden's county dispatch bill has been paid until July.

He also said the Rockland police and fire chiefs, along with Rockport's fire chief, Camden’s Fire Chief Chris Farley and himself had discussed creating a new dispatch service, and while he said it would be a good service, he referenced the small pool of potential employees..

“I think everyone is going to have an issue to staff,” he said.

Farley described to the Select Board how the 911 communications system would work if KRCC had to hand operations back to Waldo Communications Center. There have been some technical improvements since 2023 with radio transmissions.

With the current KRCC system, “If you were to stand out here," he said, pointing to the street outside the meeting room, "and dialed 911, your call is going to get answered in Rockland. Back when we changed it over [to Waldo in 2023], if you stood out here and your call got answered in Belfast, they took the necessary information and then transferred it down to Rockland, and it was dispatched by staff down here.”

But, he said, the system has been improved, and, “what we are looking at now is that the whole cycle is being taken care of in Waldo."

Select Board member Tom Hedstrom responded, and floated the idea of permanently switching over to Waldo Communications Center: "That's my question for you. We are on the Waldo County line here. Are we a little bit of a free agent come July?"

"We should rejoin Waldo County," said Camden Select Board member Alison McKellar, earning a chuckle from the board and chiefs. "Camden needs to be part of Waldo County, the entire town."

Gagne noted that while Waldo County's communication center has done Knox a "great service, they still have an entire county of their own."

"I think we need to give the two [new Knox County] commissioners, the new director and administrator the opportunity until sometime later this month," said Farley.

"Let's give it a chance," said Hedstrom, but added that Caler should talk with Waldo County to explore an alternative relationship, should the situation further deteriorate.. 

Farley noted to the Select Board that the Knox RCC would benefit from a vision plan to help address long-standing problems.

"This has been no surprise," said Gagne. "Chris [Farley] started sounding the alarm about the problems there [at KRCC] five years ago."

"I think seven years ago," said Caler.

That set off a conversation amongst the Camden Select Board members about the lack of planning, and regional planning, at Knox County government, in general.

"What we have are all these little towns doing their own thing," said McKellar.

Caler closed the conversation with a heads-up that it is budget season, which presents an opportunity to raise awareness and hear new ideas.

"I don't care who does dispatch,” said Gagne.” I need to know that when my officer calls, somebody is going to answer that radio, and when somebody takes that call it is going to be correct information. They are not going to be put on hold. We owe it to our employees, our citizens, to give the best quality dispatch we can.”

Farley noted that McKellar's idea of establishing performance standards for a communications center held merit.

"The new director has a fair amount of experience in the field,” he said, especially with dispatch centers in different parts of the country.

Part of the accreditation process is getting community feedback, he said.

“Hopefully, that is something he can develop well in the future,” said Farley.

For Ratner, the goal is to hold the center.

"We have been proactive," he said, both with Waldo County Commissioners and their dispatch administrators, as well as the State of Maine, "to make sure they are aware of what we are doing, and what we are doing to fix any issues."

He said: "We have it under control with a good plan, and new people are in the pipeline to work at dispatch," he said. "I think we have strong support from our public safety people. It is smart of them to be proactive and make sure public safety was being taken care of."

But, he said, "it doesn’t make sense to split things up."

Reach Editorial Director Lynda Clancy at lyndaclancy@penbaypilot.com; 207-706-6657