Keep your damned criticism.

Well, the media's in our asses again. At least it's not the front page, but it's the editorial page of the Sun-Times. As usual, shock value and half-stories prevail. For those of you who are starting refusals to patronize media outlets (Good man/woman), we'll dice the editorial up into misinformed excerpts here. And they can take this information and print it in their rag.

It took an appalling 26 minutes for dispatchers to direct police to a bloody brawl.

Okay, that's already a known fact. What's not widely known is the reason(s) why. The investigation just began this week. You've printed that officials say it should be done within 30 days. Jumping the gun, perhaps?

Officials said the response time...should be 2 to 3 minutes.

Right, in spite of police department general orders that allow for 10 minutes to dispatch Priority 1 calls. In spite of the general citizen belief that in a city of 3,000,000+ citizens, there are enough police to address everyone's "issue" immediately. Keep believing misinformed "officials" who can't decide whether we take 57 million or 2 billion calls a year.

...Not everyone left adrift of the 911 system is so lucky. In 2002, [Ronyale White] call 911 four times before she was shot to death by her estranged husband.

And it was determined that the call was dispatched within the established time parameters. There was effectively no delay in the dispatch of that initial call, and it was officially determined that the officers who were dispatched within those time parameters did not respond in a timely manner. But all that information detracts from the mud-slinging aimed at us. [PCOs: We TELL you that if they can pin it on you, they will. Even if it's NOT your fault.]

Hundreds of 911 calls are made a day.

Really? Try thousands. On a busy day in the summer, we can easily surpass 20 thousand 911 calls in a 24-hour period. And on the best of days, there are less than 40 people assigned per hour to handle up to 1,200 calls in that hour.

Not to mention, what about your quotes of "57 million" and "2 billion" per year? 57 million calls a year is 156,000+ calls per day. But saying "hundreds" minimizes our jobs instead of acknowledging how much work we do well. Now that something's gone wrong, we're just pieces of shit to blame things on.

It would be unreasonable to expect a flawless performance by dispatchers and police. But there is no room for error when lives are at risk.

Then hire robots. You can't put stipulations on what should and shouldn't be flawless. Either you expect flawlessness or you don't. How can you admit unreasonable expectations, and in the next sentence say the opposite? Self-contradictory statements hold no water.

At the very least, there should be no second chances for dispatchers and police who compromise or undermine this system.

So then the policy should be "Revolving Door." You keep your job until you *allegedly* fuck up once. Then you're out the door to make room for the next sucker to hang around until he/she "fucks up" and gets thrown to the wolves. The 3rd Floor Atrium might as well have an alligator pit dug out in the middle of it.

We recall a time a couple of years back when CPD had a "Media Day" of sorts. When the media laid weeks of hell on the department for police shootings, CPD invited the media to do simulations at the range, and they found out that the job they were criticizing wasn't the simple task they assumed it to be.

And we think that OEC Administration should do the same. Invite the media to sit in with 911 calltakers and dispatchers and find out firsthand what a stressful, daunting job we undertake every day.

But that's a pipe dream. We'd have to be backed and not get "thrown under the bus." We'd have to be *believed in* and have someone on our side.

Good going

Congratulations are in order. Per the Illinois Labor Board, Supervising PCOs are now unionized and represented by the Teamsters as of today.

Any chance that we can switch to a union that'll actually benefit us more than IBEW "works" to?

Here's an idea.

Since they're installing new consoles (although heaven only knows when they're going to start), we think they should be personalized. They probably won't switch over the bulk of what's currently on the consoles (This blog's ad magnets that noone ever notices, SOPs, various zone-specific notes, etc...).

We hope the new consoles are nice (although we maintain that anything's an improvement), but in an effort to make ourselves all feel more at home with decorations, we propose the installation of one of these on every brand new console.


Hell, we'll even pay the total cost out of pocket for them as a "public service." They should be installed at double-size on the calltaker side, since we're expected to be "customer service representatives" now.

Contract Negotions, Part I

We credit a source for this, we weren't actually there.

The union wants what CPD is asking for, which includes a 24% pay increase over 4 years, less healthcare costs out of pocket, and an annual stipend in lieu of the lifting of residency requirement. We personall prefer the lifting of the residency requirement so we can be released from the tax-thirsty grasp of this godforsaken shithole, but we digress.

Also up for discussion are duty availability pay for all PCOs (we like); guidelines for when mandatory OT can be invoked by management, which would not include the staff shortages that are inherent in a public safety outfit that's poorly staffed to begin with; and specific rules which govern voluntary overtime. That's to so more clarification about does straight seniority 1st/2nd RDO or "my watch" get called first.

As for those surveys, rotating-seniority mandatory OT which rotates among everyone will stay. It was a close vote, but it won. Annual seniority will be fixed in the future, and the subject of pay increases was the sweeping main concern among PCOs, although OJT, wage compression (Read: It takes me a shorter time to reach top pay), and detail positions were also major concerns among pcos.

Disappointing turnout, though. Out of roughly 400 PCOs and ACOs, only 175 surveys were turned in. If you didn't turn one in (we did), and you don't speak up formally before the contract is ratified (you have at least 2 years), then feel free to STFU when something you dread stays in place or becomes policy. In fact, please STFU if such will be the case.

Open discussion, that is all for now.

Residency.

Over at Second City Cop, there's talk about the Chicago Teachers Union pushing a House bill to lift their residency requirement, which has been around for 20 years. The bill is circulating through state government to make Chicago's residency requirement illegal. It already passed the state House by a vote of 105 to 4, next step is the Senate.

The Scum-Times artticle SCC references states that CPS is the only district in Illinois with a residency rule. Of course it is, we all know how the city is, it's "exempt" from state law.

Mayor Daley has been a big proponent. He has argued that teachers will invest more in the schools if they live in the city.

Yeah - "invest more" as in "pump more money in" by way of rising taxes.

Of course, the article also states that "critics fear eliminating the rule will prompt thousands of tax-paying teachers to move out of Chicago. That old bottom line is always the biggest factor in the city's decisions, damn us city employees to hell.

We've wondered for a long time why the city requires its employees to live within the city limits, when most other cities in the state have nothing closer to that than a "x-mile radius" requirement, meaning you have to live within x miles of that city's boundaries. We always figured the city didn't want lose the tax base that is its employees. Not to mention, it's easier to make us comply with the rules, i.e., $75 city stickers. If we don't pay in a timely fashion, we get suspended. Which is understandable, we're not trying to shirk our responsibilities.

Okay, most of us aren't.

But housing is cheaper in suburbs, schools are better in the suburbs, the taxes are lower in the suburbs, and most importantly - it's easier to find a decent area to live in for a not-exorbitant house price. A lot of people talk around the job about how ridiculous it is that we're forced to live in the city on blue-collar salaries when costs of housing are sky high. A condominium around the OEMC grounds can fetch $400,000 easy.

We wonder if, as SCC suggests, the Teachers Union's House bill will set a precedent for other city workers. If it does (and our union bothers to join other unions to fight for us), then we can easily see people moving to suburbs in droves. And count us in.