Little Rock will provide employment incentives to 911 operators in response to years of workforce shortages

Little Rock, Arkansas – The municipal board of directors recently passed a resolution that will give newly recruited 911 operators in Little Rock an additional $2,500 to start their new jobs.

The resolution, which was approved on Wednesday, established a new employment incentive program that pays applicants who have finished the training. Nevertheless, the candidate will have to repay the incentive if they don’t stay employed as a communications operator for two years.

According to Juana Green, director of Little Rock Emergency Communications, there are 17 open dispatcher positions out of 48 in operations. She is hoping that their hiring efforts would be aided by the new incentives.

The number of dispatcher openings has fluctuated throughout time, but it has always been in the double digits.

According to Green, there were 29 operational vacancies in 2022. “We had 22 openings in 2023.”

The department is improving, but there are still too many openings, which has a cascading impact.

“We aim to achieve the national benchmark of responding to 95% of 911 calls within 20 seconds,” stated Green.

According to Green, this year’s figure is much different from 2022, when they were only averaging about 60%. She claimed that they are now more in line with the national standard than ever before.

93% of 911 calls are completed in 20 seconds on average, according to Green.

According to Green, finding and keeping employees in light of the labor shortages is an issue facing the entire sector.

“We’re getting to the phones as quickly as possible, but this is where filling in those vacancies comes into play,” Green said in reference to the fact that it’s usual for someone to call a 911 center and not get an answer right away.

Green anticipates that the two main performance concerns will be finally fixed with the implementation of the new steps.