"Something goes wrong. You write them up, do the paperwork, but the next week they do three good things and nobody remembers. Getting Guardian Tracking is one of the best things we’ve done to improve positivity."— Rick Anderson, 911 Coordinator
As the primary dispatch center for the entire county, Stevens County 911 services six cities, 15 unincorporated communities, and a population of over 47,000 spread across 2,541 square miles. In addition to the services provided to residents of Stevens County, the center also dispatches fire and EMS for the eastern half of Ferry County and facilitates communications between Border Patrol and local law enforcement regarding the 40 miles of the border the county shares with Canada.
Before implementing Guardian Tracking in 2018, the center was documenting and tracking performance data using a manual paper system.
Rick Anderson, who manages the dispatch center, said he was recommended Guardian Tracking by another dispatcher from a neighboring county.
“We were at an APCO conference. My colleague from another dispatch center grabbed me and dragged me over and said, ‘You got to come see this thing. We’re using it and we’ve had really good results with it,’” Rick said.
After that, the decision to adopt the solution was easy.
“We liked what we saw, and we could afford it,” he said. “Before, performance records were in a file cabinet. We would make a copy of each record, put it in the file folder, and then it just got lost from there.”
Through Guardian Tracking, Stevens County 911 has:
“We’re in a funny business because when you don’t hear anything, generally, that means things are going well. But we’re really trying to foster positivity. With staff shortages and rollover, it’s been tough, but we’re in a better place now than we’ve been for a while,” Rick said.
To read more client testimonials, check out our Success Stories.
